It may look a little different, but soccer in Squamish is operational under COVID-19 protocols this autumn.
Squamish Youth Soccer Association (SYSA) president Tim Sjogren is happy with how play has resumed with COVID-19 procedures and protocols in place.
Among the off-field changes, in addition to the commonplace distancing and sanitizing recommendations, are changes in scheduling to accommodate more time for turnover between games and practices
"In the past, we'd have more people at once, but this year, we've got more spread-out game times and that seems to have worked well," he said. "We've also spread the fields out a bit more than we have in the past."
Sjogren added that while there have been issues elsewhere in the province — such as in Chilliwack, where the local association has hired private security to deal with parents who act abusive to volunteers and contact tracers —gentle reminders for local parents have been all that's needed.
"We need to continually remind parents to physically distance themselves while at the fields," he said. "We're asking spectators to make sure that they're spread out around the edge of the field — sometimes people do that and sometimes people don't. We're doing our best to encourage that physical distancing.
"We've been lucky, I think. We certainly had anyone getting upset or irate around us."
On the field, players are adapting to rules such as implementing kick-ins instead of throw-ins. Sjogren said it's not a significant change for several players.
"House league age groups, which is basically everyone who's 10 and under, most of them [those eight and under) were doing kick-ins already," he said. "For those who came from the younger age group into the older age group this year, it wouldn't be a change for them because they've still never done a throw-in."
Like in other sports, travelling teams are in small cohorts, which has created scheduling challenges.
"Many of our teams are in cohorts of only three teams so they have a bye every third week," he said.
As well, Sjogren's U17 boys' team has only played two of its four scheduled games because of not only a potential COVID-19 exposure, but because of unsafe air quality conditions during the stretch when there was wildfire smoke. Normally, the team would have played roughly seven games.
Sjogren said other teams haven't been as acutely affected and have played four or five games at this point.
Considering the initial uncertainty around the fall season, Sjogren said participation has been steady, keeping in line with 2019 numbers at roughly 550.
"In mid-August, we were right off," he said. "Our younger ages, our house league programs, I think we had about 50 people signed up in mid-August. That's hundreds and hundreds less players.
"We had the most registrations ever in September."
The current fall season runs until December, and over the winter, there may be some academy-style programming for athletes aged 10 to 14.
In other exciting news for the club, BC Soccer announced on Oct. 31 that SYSA had achieved its charter certification.
Technical director Peter Weiland said the club had worked toward its Charter 1 certification for the past year.
"It's a big step and an assurance to our members that we're conducting operations to the highest standards," he said, adding that the club produced documentation regarding its technical coaching, governance and administration.
The complete criteria is available at https://clubcharter.bcsoccer.net/standardcriteria.
Weiland added that the SYSA is continuing to work toward the BC Soccer goal of having an age-group-trained coach for each of its divisions.
"[We want] the right steps at the right age so that they all have the best chance for really good technical development," he said.
