It's been just over six years since the Canadian Premier League's inaugural match in 2019, when 17,611 fans saw Forge FC draw 1-1 with York9 FC at Hamilton Stadium.
On Tuesday though, when 17,971 packed those same stands to break the league's all-time attendance record, many of the same characters were involved.
Forge's second annual School Day Match brought a flood of students from 150 schools in Hamilton and the surrounding area, which made for a rambunctious atmosphere to accompany a fiery 2-2 standoff between the home side and Atlético Ottawa.
Just like in that 2019 clash, Bobby Smyrniotis was on the touchline. And, as usual, Kyle Bekker and Alexander Achinioti-Jönsson started for Forge. Ironically though, two Ottawa players -- Nathan Ingham and Manny Aparicio -- also played in the inaugural game, having donned York's colours in the CPL's first few campaigns.
All of them are uniquely positioned to understand just how special Tuesday's event was. It's not just the fact that more people were in attendance to watch a CPL match than ever before.
It wasn't a crowd of schoolchildren completely unfamiliar with Forge FC. Hundreds of them wore jerseys, or came touting scarves and flags. Those in the front row hailed players by name, pleading for autographs and photos postmatch.
And it was an atmosphere that undoubtedly gave the home side a push -- at least, that's what Smyrniotis and Bekker said postmatch, suggesting the extra energy Forge drew from the crowd helped them respond so quickly both times Ottawa took the lead on Tuesday.
Ultimately though, the greatest triumph of the day wasn't on the pitch; it was that thousands of young spectators, whether familiar with Forge or not, left the building having helped make Canadian sports history -- and been thoroughly entertained by two Canadian professional soccer teams.
Ingham and Bekker, who have helped build the CPL from day one as players, understood the importance of Tuesday's game.
"I can only imagine what it would be like if I got to go watch a professional soccer game when I was in elementary school," Nathan Ingham said after the match. "I would've been losing my mind, I think I would've been one of the loudest ones in the stadium. It's really cool to see, these are the things that we need to be doing as a league. We get a lot of interest from these kids, hopefully they're coming back with their parents on the weekend."
Ingham, who -- like Forge -- was also part of the 2022 CPL Final in Ottawa, which featured another of the league's largest ever crowds at 14,992, knows these are the games he'll remember years down the road.
"It's something that I'll look back on really fondly," he said. "I'm sure I'll have some pictures up in my house when I'm an old man, walking around and pointing out to my kids that I was pretty good one time."
Meanwhile, Bekker was quick to point out the domino impact that Tuesday could have -- perhaps even more so than if there'd been 17,000 adult fans at the game.
It's one thing to build the club's fanbase in the community, and undoubtedly a lot more supporters were created on this day. Further constructive to the Canadian soccer cause, however, is how many of those youngsters likely play the game at some level, and now might truly believe they could one day play in a game like this.
"If I was in the position of the kids in the crowd I'd be buzzing; this is the thing that I was itching for when I was a kid," Bekker said. "Hopefully there are some soccer players in the crowd that are inspired to know that the professional game is in their backyard, and if they just keep pushing, they can break in and make a name for themselves. Maybe the next CPL star was in the stands today."
Even now, in the CPL's seventh season, we have a handful of players who were one day in the stands at a game as a fan. York United's Max Ferrari, for instance, was a season ticket holder at York Lions Stadium in 2019 before joining the club as a 19-year-old the next year.
Most of the fans in attendance in Hamilton on Tuesday will have to wait a little longer than that for their professional debuts (although maybe not much longer, considering how well 16-year-old Sergei Kozlovskiy has been playing for Ottawa). However, moments like these are what lay the foundations for the next generation of Canadian fans and players.
Maybe, 10 years from now, a Forge FC player will remember the day his class took a field trip to Hamilton Stadium, and he first fell in love with the club.
