Canadian keeper Labbé exits ‘at the top of her game’

Meaghen Johnson

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When Canada’s women’s soccer team takes the field Thursday to kick off the inaugural Arnold Clark Cup in England, they’ll do so without their minister of defence, Stephanie Labbé. She’ll be watching from home, enjoying a few beers, or maybe trying her hand at curling.

“It's time for some other goalkeepers to take the reins and take over,” she said.

Last month, Labbé, 35, announced her retirement after more than a decade with the national team, where she recorded 85 caps and 43 clean sheets (third-most in team history).

She left her club, Paris Saint-Germain, after the winter break, and will officially retire from her national team duties after a sendoff match at home in April.

Labbé will forever be known for her performance at last summer’s Tokyo Games, particularly in penalty kicks against Sweden in the gold-medal match. Armed with her trademark pink hairband and a smile directed at opponents, she made two key saves during penalties to help Canada win a historic gold.

“Selfishly, you want people to stick around forever,” goalkeeper Erin McLeod, Labbé’s teammate since 2008, told TSN. “But at the same time, I have a tremendous amount of respect for Steph… I'm happy for her that she's found that moment, because sometimes people play too long. I think she went out at the right time. She's at the top of her game.”

Other members of Canada’s unofficial goalkeepers’ union can’t sing Labbé’s praises enough.

“She's a legend. She's gonna be a Canadian legend forever,” Kailen Sheridan, who’s been with the senior team since 2016, told TSN. “I've just learned so much from her and I'm really grateful to have that opportunity to work with her.”

Prior to her retirement announce, Labbé was named as runner-up for FIFA Goalkeeper of the Year, losing to Chile’s Christiane Endler.

When asked if she thinks Labbé should have earned the accolade, Sheridan’s answer is simple:

“Obviously.”

Labbé said she was honoured to be in the running but believes her performance last year speaks for itself.

“If you look at the stats, I truly believe that I was right up there in terms of what I was able to do and I was able to perform for club and country,” she told TSN. “Taking our country to a gold medal win and playing a part in that – I think that's something that nobody will ever be able to take away from me. At the end of the day, I'll take the gold medal over anything.”

“It's been really cool actually to hear a lot of her quotes recently, because I think a lot of times Canadians are just too damn humble,” McLeod said. “Just her talking about how proud she is of her career, to be an Olympian, to have such an impact in this Olympics. – I'm proud of her.”

Retirement had been on Labbé’s mind before Tokyo. Prior to the Olympics being postponed by a year, she and her partner, fellow Olympian Georgia Simmerling, had contemplated ending their respective careers following the Games.

After the success of Tokyo, Labbé decided to sign with top club, Paris Saint-Germain.

“I was like, ‘What's another six months?’” she said. “I can delay my retirement until next June. This was a great opportunity, to go to an amazing club…what a way to go out.”

Labbé said she had every intention of finishing the season with PSG, and potentially even beyond, with an option in her contract for another year. But once the high of the Olympics began to wane, she noticed something was missing – a spark.

“I remember I was stepping on the field for games and just didn't feel that same electricity through my body that we feel when we step on the field, that adrenaline rush and that excitement,” she said.

Labbé spoke to several retired athletes who all told her the same thing: when you know, you know. She soon understood exactly what that meant.

“I really just hit that point where…  you just really feel so fulfilled and you really feel like you've literally left everything on the playing field,” she said. “And that's not a bad thing. I think that's a great thing – that feeling that you've given everything and you're ready to give things to something else now.”

Labbé, a native of Stony Plain, Alta., first joined the senior team in 2008. For years, she found herself behind McLeod and retired great Karina LeBlanc. She had to fight for playing time, making just 25 appearances from 2008 to 2014.

In 2012, she decided to step away from the national team to focus on her club in Sweden. She subsequently missed the London Olympics, where the team won bronze.

But Labbé has absolutely no qualms about the ups and downs of her career.

“I wouldn't be where I am right now. I wouldn't have been able to put in those performances this summer if my journey had gone differently – if I had come into the team at a time where I slid right into the starting position, if I didn't have that period on the national team where I was getting very little playing time,” she said.

“Everything that I went through, every challenge, every obstacle that came my way, shaped me into the confident, resilient leader that I am. And yeah, I think it's easy to look back and be like, ‘Oh, I wish I played more. I wish things went a little easier here.’ And at the time, I felt like it was the end of the world, as we all do when we're in hard times. But I truly believe that everything happened for a reason.”

In many ways, Labbé’s career was about overcoming adversity. At last summer’s Olympics, she had to battle back from a rib injury she suffered in the opening match again Japan, which she described as “excruciating,” as she went in and out of hospital due to fluids in her chest.

“Every time she got knocked down, she's gotten up and proved to be better than what other people have put her in this box to be,” Sheridan said.

Labbé became Canada’s No. 1 ‘keeper in 2016, stepping into the role after McLeod injured her knee. She led the team to another bronze that year, but struggled in the aftermath with depression.

She has been outspoken about her own battles with mental health, including most recently after winning gold in Tokyo.

“I continue to be impressed by these top-level athletes who are vulnerable and want to talk about these things,” McLeod said. “Steph has been an advocate for mental health, and I think Canadians are better for it.”

“The one thing I come back to is just that I was always real and authentic, that I stuck true to who I was throughout the whole time, whether that was wearing my heart on my sleeve, sticking up for things that I believed in… [or] using my voice when maybe other people didn't have a voice,” Labbé said.

Along with her Olympics medals, Labbé was also part of three World Cups and played professionally for several different clubs in Sweden, as well as in the National Women’s Soccer League for the Washington Spirit and North Carolina Courage.

She also trained with the Calgary Foothills in 2018, a men’s team in the second division of the United Soccer League (formerly known as the Premier Development League). While the team expressed interest in having her join the roster, the PDL denied Labbé of the opportunity, citing “gender-based eligibility requirements.”

Her fellow goalkeepers on the national team cite Labbé’s technical ability on the ball, her distribution, and her composure as among her greatest strengths on the field.

But her legacy goes beyond her prowess on the pitch.

“Something I've always been proud of, the thing that I know I brought to this team, and the thing that I know was my biggest impact, is my leadership,” Labbé said. “I know that I have a presence on the field that brings a sense of calm and composure to the team in front of me, even in games where I might not visually be doing a lot in terms of making big saves.”

That leadership is being felt by the next generation of Canadian keepers. Rylee Foster earned her first call-up to camp with the senior team last year, and although she’s still awaiting her first cap, the 23-year-old took away some invaluable lessons from the veteran.

“Steph was the person that's going to show you by leading by example and hold you accountable for what you do and what you don't do,” Foster told TSN. “If I'm not shooting the ball well enough or hitting the ball hard enough, she’s gonna call me out and tell me. She raised my standards every single day, and I brought that into my own [club] environment.”

“Goalkeepers are always competitive, and we’re in this environment where you're never guaranteed anything and you're always competing,” Sheridan said. “But since the minute I was called into camp, [Labbé] created this really welcoming and positive environment where we could all learn from each other and talk and grow. And it was still competitive – by no means was it less competitive at all – but she made it in a positive way, where we could learn from each other.”

Sheridan, 26, is widely considered to be the Labbé’s successor as Canada’s starting goalkeeper. Sheridan challenged Labbé for the role prior to last year’s Olympics but got sidetracked after injuring her quad at the SheBelieves Cup at the beginning of the year.

Sheridan said the injury came at a competitive time for the team, but Labbé was first-and-foremost concerned for her wellbeing.

“Honestly, it could have been really easy for her to shut me out and let me figure my surgery out and my injury by myself,” she said. “But since the minute that everything happened, she was checking in and always there, being supportive, and trying to do everything she could to help me get back in with the team. She's just an incredible friend.”

The location for Labbé’s send-off game in April is still being determined, but she hopes it will be an opportunity for her friends and family to celebrate with her. She plans to train with the Calgary Foothills once again to stay fit for the match.

After her farewell in April, she will begin to focus on her next adventure, which will include planning a wedding with her fiancée, Simmerling. Labbé sees herself staying involved in soccer, and lists coaching as a possibility.

But no matter the future job title, Labbé plans to use her voice to speak out about raising the bar for women’s soccer in Canada.

“I know that I'm one of the more vocal players on the team. I'm happy doing that,” she said. “I know that over the course of my career, the game has changed so much… I just want to see that same growth continue to happen when the team is getting better and better results. This team can't be put on the backburner. It's continuing to push for what this team deserves and really speaking out about that.”