St. John's Soccer Club

New Canada Soccer Grassroots Guidelines

Saturday, February 14, 2026

Canada Soccer has just officially announced a few changes to the Grassroots Standards. Please see the article below:
 
 
The biggest change is as follows:
 
To further support the implementation of the Grassroots Standards, an updated version has been developed through ongoing consultation with Provincial and Territorial Member Associations. Recognizing challenges related to infrastructure, this update introduces greater flexibility in goal sizes. It also allows for tiering to begin at U10, down from U11 in the original Standards. This change aligns the approach for 7v7 soccer at both U10 and U11 and better reflects the start of league play. All other elements of the Standards released in 2025 remain unchanged.
 
As noted above, this is a recent change, and not something that was on the initial version of the Grassroots Standards. The NLSA will align with Canada Soccer and will allow tiering at U10. This has been changed on our website as well: https://cloud.rampinteractive.com/nlsa/files/Canada%20Soccer%20Grassroots%20Standards%20for%20NL%202026.pdf
 
If you have further questions, please feel free to reach out. 
 
Thanks,
 

--

Adam Mooi
 
Technical Director
Newfoundland and Labrador Soccer Association 

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