Canada to host 2015 Women's World Cup
Reuters - Thursday 03 March 2011, 17:08
OTTAWA - From Parliament Hill to the snow-covered playgrounds, Canada has
welcomed the chance to host the 2015 Women's World Cup after FIFA rubber-stamped their
application at a meeting in Switzerland on Thursday.
Canada was left as the lone candidate to stage the seventh edition of the quadrennial
tournament after Zimbabwe withdrew their bid earlier this week.
"We would like to thank FIFA for entrusting the Canadian Soccer Association (CSA) with this
prestigious event," CSA president Dominic Maestracci said in a statement.
The 2015 tournament will be the largest women's World Cup ever held after FIFA agreed to
expand the number of competing countries from 16 to 24 and increase the total number of games
from 32 to 52.
The venues have yet to be decided but seven cities were listed as potential hosts in the bid
document: Vancouver, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Ottawa, Montreal, Halifax and Moncton.
The United States hosted the women's World Cup in 1999 and 2003 and the decision to award
the 2015 event to Canada is a further demonstration of the increasing popularity of the sport
in North America.
Hockey-mad Canada now has three franchises in Major League Soccer, the premier men's
competition in North America, and the CSA said football was now the most popular female sport in
Canada, with 400,000 registered females.
"We have an exceptional national women's football program and it will be exciting to see our
team compete here," Canada Prime Minister Stephen Harper said.
The next women's World Cup will be held in Germany later this year. Canada qualified after
winning the CONCACAF women's Gold Cup.