Kicking it old school: Why these childhood friends never want to stop playing soccer together
'Soccer is a way of life,' say 'No New Friends' players in Creator Network video
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Victories. Losses. Injuries, career changes, moves, fatherhood.
Over their more than a decade on the pitch, "No New Friends" soccer players have seen it all, says longtime player and co-organizer Nick Pouponneau.
He attributes the 60-minute Ottawa Footy Sevens soccer league games to helping him and other players navigate life both on and off the field.
"No matter what happens, it's always going to be there for me, whether we win, whether we lose," Pouponneau said. "Soccer to me … it's a way of life."
Pouponneau decided to profile the longtime team and explore how the sport has shaped its members in a video for CBC Ottawa's Creator Network.
WATCH | 'No New Friends FC':
Old friends and foes
"Everything's happened, right? There've been breakups, there've been new jobs, they've been marriages," said longtime player Dominic Goss about the team, which came together over a decade ago from a group of friends who'd been who'd been playing — or against each other — since they were boys.
"I mean, it's been life, right? [That] happened in the meantime."
When soccer scholarships and degrees wrapped, the childhood buddies found themselves back in the city, at loose ends and looking for a way to bring serious soccer back into their lives, said Pouponneau. The name references a Drake song from that era.
"We called ourselves No New Friends because we just had known each other for so long that it's like, 'Oh, we don't need new friends," said Pouponneau.
He joked it's ironic because these days, players struggle to balance soccer and other commitments, and they often need new friends — especially those with younger legs — to pick up the slack.
Soccer bonds and life plans
But Goss said the teammates' history starts much earlier, back when soccer wasn't as popular in Ottawa, and the tight-knit community, many of them new to the country, often crossed paths at the gym at St. Patrick's High School.
"Soccer was very much a sport played by immigrants and the kids of immigrants," recalled Goss, whose family immigrated from South Africa. He recalls his Canadian-born school friends tended to play hockey.
"So it was a great bonding experience [for newcomers] that I think was necessary for a lot of people who maybe otherwise could have felt like outsiders."
"We came to Canada in 1995 … from a war-torn country, and then one of the ways I made friends ... was through soccer," confirmed longtime player Francis Mavula, whose family came from Burundi, and whose brother also plays on the team.
Mavula said soccer went on to shape the course of his life. After dreaming of becoming a professional player, he scored a soccer scholarship and went on to captain the men's team at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut.
"Soccer has had such a huge impact on my life. I think outside of my parents, it's been the biggest influence in who I am," he reflected, adding that he remains in touch with teammates despite being sidelined this season by a broken ankle.
The sport also had a big impact on Pascal-Olivier Ouandji, who joined the team more recently. Raised in Cameroon and Kenya, he moved to southern France as a teen to pursue serious soccer at a high school affiliated with a soccer club, later coming to Ottawa with a plan to pursue sports journalism.
"I was so obsessed with sports and [soccer] in particular that I kind of planned my whole life around it," said Ouandji, who like many of the players now works for the federal government and also makes music.
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More than just a game
As they got older, many of the players say they struggled with balancing their love of the game with adult responsibilities. But for some, that made the team even more important.
"I'm 39 years old. I have a two-year-old daughter now," said player Aras Tahir, who grew up with this group. "It's kind of hard to keep in touch with people, and soccer is our way."
Pouponneau said he, too, is grateful for the weekly excuse to connect.
"We always have these long goodbyes at the end of the game in the parking lot, and we're walking out and they're shutting off the lights in the facility," he said, explaining it's a chance to catch up on everything from kids to sleep patterns, to more serious topics.
"A lot of times you'll see guys hang back and have those more deep conversations from, like, 'Hey, I'm really struggling with XYZ thing,' or, 'I'm feeling stressed about work.' Just get advice from that kind of brotherhood perspective."
Now that many of the players have become dads themselves, they say the team's weekly games are a way to pass on that passion for sport and time with friends to the next generation.
But despite the increasingly family feel of the weekly games and the age of the longtime players, they stress that competition is still fierce.
"That's what's so great about sports. It's a continuous challenge, and especially as you get older, the challenge changes, and ... gets more difficult as well, right?" said Goss. The team was league champion last year and is in the playoffs again this season.
"I mean, you know what these young guys are like. They can just run and run for days, which is not something that any of us are capable of, and as a result we rely heavily on our experience."
Soccer on film
Pouponneau, who now works in the fitness technology field, said he teamed up with filmmakers Pearly Pouponneau, his partner, and Evan Hartling to tell this story as a tribute not just to his childhood friend group, but to other longtime teams and groups he's seen over the years.
"I think that there's a lot of versions of No New Friends out there... guys that are playing together week in week out," he said, adding that he was pleased to learn through this project just how important the team has become.
"It was just a bunch of friends getting together once a week, and we didn't know where that would lead to. But it's just kind of continued for over 10 years now, where we're still doing it," reflected Mavula with a laugh.
"People get older, people get hurt ... life gets complicated. I want us to just keep it going. I want us to play as long as we can," added Goss.
"I can't understate the importance of how soccer shaped the trajectory of my life," said Pouponneau. "When you meet people who get it ... they get it, you know?"
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