The first Ontario Soccer Provincial Projects weekends of 2020 kicked off at the Ontario Soccer Centre on Jan. 11 and 12.
The selected athletes, between 40-50 per age group and gender, were previously evaluated at the Provincial Screening Competition in October, or throughout the year and are now being further screened as part of the Provincial Projects.
The screening sessions and the preparation weekends take place at the Ontario Soccer Centre, before the final roster selections for the Provincial Teams are announced in April.
The Provincial Program is available to all Ontario Soccer registered players who are competing at either a U14, U15 or U16 age group and focuses on player screening, talent identification and benchmarking of players through competition.
The year-round program culminates at the Inter-Provincial Competition in April, where Canada Soccer will be present to scout the players for potential invites to National Excel Environments.
The Ontario Provincial Development League (OPDL) is the primary venue in which potential Provincial Team Players are detected. There are however, alternative player detection options for those Ontario Soccer registered players who do not compete within the OPDL.
Team Ontario kicks off against competition in a three-game series on April 24-26, 2020.