Beckie talks trade, drone controversy and CBA negotiations with Canada Soccer

Coming off a tumultuous year where she suffered a season-ending ACL tear, Canadian international Janine Beckie started 2024 with a bang. She netted a brace for the Portland Thorns in their season opener, 366 days after her injury.

Following a year of so much uncertainty, Beckie had a lot to look forward to in 2024 – for both club and country. Canada’s women’s soccer team was preparing for the summer’s Paris Olympics, where they would enter as defending champions for the first time at a major tournament.

But this year has ended up having surprises of its own.

Canada was eliminated in the quarter-finals of the Olympics in a tournament that was largely overshadowed by allegations of spying by members of the Canadian staff. Bev Priestman, the team’s head coach, was suspended for a year.

And just over two weeks after Canada’s Olympic run ended, Beckie was traded by Portland to Racing Louisville.

“It was obviously a shock to me,” Beckie said about the trade. “But I think when I moved past the shock, I really am happy, and I think it ended up being a really good move for me, which I know for a lot of players is not always the reality.”

Beckie, a versatile forward, admits she had mixed emotions about the trade initially and how everything came to be. Her contract with the Thorns was set to expire at the end of this year, but there was an option to extend for the 2025 season. Beckie was still unsure whether she would take it or if the Thorns would choose to exercise it. 

Before she left for Paris, she told her agent didn’t want to have any further conversations regarding her contract until she was back in Portland. After the Olympics, Beckie took some time off and vacationed in Mexico with her fiancé.

She received a text from her agent during that vacation, saying a potential trade was in the works. The day before she was set to fly back to Portland, she spoke to her agent and Karina LeBlanc, the Thorns’ general manager, about the move.

She returned to Portland on Saturday, Aug. 17. By early next week, the league had approved the trade, which was around the same time Beckie had first spoken to personnel with Racing. By Thursday, she was in Louisville.

“It all happened really fast, and I did not anticipate that it would happen as fast as it was going to happen,” Beckie told TSN. “I think it was just an accumulation of bad timing off the back of a tough summer, like there wasn't really a lot of time to communicate the situation to me.”

A day after Beckie’s trade was officially announced, the NWSL Players Association also released details about the new collective bargaining agreement. Part of the terms for this CBA include protection against trades without a player’s consent.

While this was not in place for Beckie’s situation, she said the Thorns did ask for her agreement to the trade before finalizing it, and she does believe that the club would have honoured her wishes if she had declined.

Despite the fact that she ultimately agreed to the trade, Beckie clarified that it was not her request to leave Portland during the season. Her frustration stems from the feeling that the decision was not entirely in her hands.

“When I heard that a trade was on the table, and that was most likely what was going to happen, as a player, you're kind of like, ‘Where would this leave me if the trade doesn’t happen?’” she said.

“I'm not going to pretend the shock of it all did not frustrate me, but I am aware of what the situation is. I am aware that it's a business, and that's what I had communicated to [LeBlanc] – essentially, you have the green light to get this over the line.”

Despite frustrations over the proceedings, Beckie stressed that there are no hard feelings with the Thorns’ front office and that she is grateful to have landed in Louisville.

“I don't have any animosity… I left the club in a happy place,” she said. “I know that it's actually a compliment to me as a player that a club wants to get something for me because they know I have value. I can be really pessimistic about the situation and say that it wasn't what I asked for at the time… But I also am feeling super positive about being here. I might not have loved how this went down, but I've come into a team that has shown me so much love.”

Beckie said she has felt that love from her first (albeit brief) conversations with Racing general manager Ryan Dell and head coach Bev Yanez. Both conveyed enthusiasm for Beckie’s experience and profile as a player.

“They saw me coming into this team and having an impact straight away,” she said. “That was very attractive for me. I'm not sure if there’s a player in the world who doesn't want to hear that a club is really excited about them.”

Although she has only played four games with her new club, Beckie, who recently celebrated her 30^th birthday, is already stepping into a leadership role with the team. Louisville has a young roster, with just two other players over the age of 30.

In Portland, Beckie was on a team laden with veterans, with the likes of Christine Sinclair, Becky Sauerbrunn and Meghan Klingenberg. She found there wasn’t as much of a leadership role to walk into with the Thorns as there is with Racing.

“I'm the type of player that I want to be relied upon. I want to have responsibility,” Beckie said. “I felt really comfortable coming in and having that vocal presence, and the girls have made me feel super welcome and super open to being able to have tactical conversations, speak up in film, be vocal on the field.”

Yanez emphasized that veteran presence when asked about Beckie and another recent acquisition, Bethany Balcer.

“Obviously, what they bring to the team is not only their attributes from a football perspective, but it's also from an experience perspective,” Yanez told the media. “You've got Janine… who very much so knows the league and understands the pressure that can come associated with any match.”

Beckie’s experience has helped her hit the ground running, as Louisville is in the thick of a fight for the postseason. Racing is currently tied with Bay FC for the eighth and final playoff spot with five games remaining in the regular season. Racing has never made the postseason since joining the league as an expansion club in 2021.

“There are natural struggles that are associated with coming into a team so fast. You're not going to build that on-field relationship as fast as you'd like,” Beckie said. “So, it's me relying on my experience and my tactical flexibility and having the right conversations and trying to build off-the-field relationships as fast as possible.”

Since joining the club, Beckie, a dual national who grew up in Highlands Ranch, Colo., has started in three of four matches (only coming off the bench in her first appearance), and she netted the game-winner in her second match, a 2-1 victory over Angel City.

“I always say that I'm more relieved to score than actually happy that I scored,” she joked. “What's so great on this team is I just know my role is so much bigger than scoring goals, and so that kind of feels like an added bonus when I do get to score.”

While Beckie has already moved on with her new club, she’s looking to do the same with the national team and put the hardships of the Olympics behind her.

Canada Soccer was embroiled in another controversy after allegations were levied by New Zealand regarding members of Canada’s staff using a drone to spy on the team’s training ahead of their opening match.

FIFA issued several sanctions against the women’s team. Priestman, along with assistant coach Jasmine Mander and analyst Joey Lombardi, were suspended for one year, and the team was deducted six points from the group standings.

Players have spoken about the tears and anger from the situation. Even nearly two months later, Beckie hasn’t been able to process everything.

“It feels like a fever dream every time someone's asked me about it. It doesn't really feel like any of that actually happened, including actually playing in the tournament,” she said.

Canada Soccer announced an independent review regarding the spying scandal on July 24 and is still awaiting those findings. As part of its release announcing an upcoming friendly against Spain, the federation stated that more information on the interim coaching staff for the October window is forthcoming.

Priestman, who is still being paid by Canada Soccer while suspended, issued an apology through her lawyers hours before Canada’s second group stage match. After the game, goalkeeper Kailen Sheridan said it was “really tough” to accept the coach’s apology. Defender Gabby Carle later told the Footy Prime podcast that she didn’t believe Priestman took responsibility for the scandal after telling the players she would.

Beckie, who has 109 caps for Canada, has long been a vocal leader for the national team. When asked how she felt Priestman handled the situation, she took a lengthy pause before choosing her words.

“I don't really want to specifically answer that question,” she said. “I would just say I'm still figuring out how I feel about the whole thing. I would never in a million years condone the actions that were taken or that they're accused of taking. Never do I want myself or my teammates to be associated with that kind of behaviour.

“How it was handled, I think, is still yet to be seen. I am very interested to see the results of the investigation, because I also think there's a lot of things the players still don't know, and the reality of the situation is the players were completely unaware that any of this was going on.”

Despite the six-point penalty, the players were able to rally under difficult circumstances and win all three of their group stage matches to advance to the knockout round.

“I will always be so amazed at the resilience of our group and the way that we galvanized and came together,” Beckie said. “And it was not even a question. We knew that we were going to stick together.”

In the first game after the sanctions were announced, Canada gutted out a come-from-behind win against France, ranked second in the world at the time, with defender Vanessa Gilles scoring the winner in the 12^th minute of stoppage time.

In the quarter-final match against Germany, Canada controlled much of the play in the second half and extra time before ultimately falling in penalties.

“It's so weird to have been knocked out where we were and feel so good about how we played,” Beckie said.

“I'm not as much pissed off that it ended the way that it did. I'm more so just so disappointed, because that was the best we'd ever played as a team at a major tournament. And I feel so confident that, had we gotten through those penalties, we would have gone on to play in the final.”

There is more reason for optimism for the national team, with Canada Soccer CEO and general secretary Kevin Blue recently announcing that a framework is in place for a new CBA with both the women’s and men’s teams. 

In his statement, Blue, who joined Canada Soccer earlier this year, characterized the pending CBA as “equitable across both programs and improves overall financial circumstances for Canada Soccer.”

Beckie is the executive director of the Canadian Soccer Players Association (CSPA), which represents the women’s national team. Earlier this month, the CSPA released a statement that acknowledged Blue’s “courtesy, transparency and candour,” a sentiment that Beckie echoed.

“I've spoken to Kevin a lot over the time that he's been in the position, and all my interactions with him have been super positive,” she said.

Beckie stressed that there is still a lot of work to be done to rebuild the relationship between the players and the federation after years of shaky practice, but she believes Blue has the players’ best interests at heart.

“I just can't say enough good things about the intricacies around how he's built back the trust that was not there for a long time… He just works from a place of gratitude and transparency and honesty and with a forward mindset,” she said.

“When you have people steering the ship that have done enough to gain your trust, it feels easier. Things might get worse before they get better. I don't know what's going to be the result of this investigation. There's just so many unknowns. But it feels a little bit more comfortable knowing that when I look at our team, I look at the leadership that's in Canada Soccer right now, I think this is the best place that we've been in considering the turbulence over the last couple of years.”