Thanks to Manitoba's traditional Victoria Day weekend weather outside, there were 200 girls running around the Subway Soccer South Indoor Complex on Monday afternoon as part of the Live Your Goals Festival.

“We could've easily had 400,” Annette Wildgoose, the woman in charge of legacies for the 2015 Women's World Cup, said as pink-clad youngsters buzzed around her in the climate controlled conditions.

Wildgoose and the rest of those organizing the Women's World Cup hope the number of girls playing soccer in Canada will swell even more because of events like Live Your Goals, a program that was incorporated in 2011 and is held in cities that host major FIFA events. Winnipeg is one of six cities that will host Women's World Cup games next month.

Simply put, Live Your Goals is a soccer clinic that tries to set itself apart from the rest. The participants, who came from five major Winnipeg soccer clubs, got pink T-shirts, a FIFA soccer ball and instruction from a group that included national women's team veterans Brittany Baxter and Melanie Booth.

The mission is to get more girls playing soccer and keep those who do play even longer than they might have remained in the sport.

“It's pretty cool, because you get to work with some Team Canada players,” 11-year-old Cara Sutherland, a member of the city's Phoenix Soccer Club, said between drills. “... They're teaching us about speed and skills and technique, and how to control the ball properly.”

Even though FIFA conducts some of the world's most popular sporting events, they want to be known for more than that.

“As much as we're involved in the excellence side, we're also concerned with the sport development side,” Wildgoose said. “This is what it is that we're trying to do through Live Your Goals, is to generate interest in young girls and women to stay in the game, because our numbers are actually very high.”

And now, thanks to the Women's World Cup and Canada's run to bronze at the 2012 Summer Olympics, young Canadian females have goals to shoot for that might not have been there before. They also have idols like Christine Sinclair or Desiree Scott to worship.

“All of this, all of hosting the Women's World Cup, is ensuring that people know more about the game and can see that it can be played a very high level, that we have Canadians who are at that level,” Wildgoose said. “So they're role models to inspiring these young girls to say, 'Maybe I can do this much longer than I thought.' And there's a structure in place for them to do it.”

As for the tournament, the teams will start arriving in Winnipeg on or around June 2, and the first two games, which are sold out, will be played on June 8 at Investors Group Field when Sweden takes on Nigeria and the U.S. battles Australia. The June 12 games, one of which also features the U.S., is also sold out, although the local organizing committee is trying to free up a few more seats. There are still tickets available for the games on June 15 and 16, according to Winnipeg venue general manager Chad Falk.

“There are thousands and thousands of Americans coming for those first two games,” Falk said, “”so I encourage everyone to get on now, because it's going to be exciting when this thing rolls into town.”

Sutherland said she'll be in attendance at IGF, and she can't wait to watch some of the world's best female soccer players.

“I'm really excited,” she said, “to see how they play and watch their techniques and learn new skills from them.”

kirk.penton@sunmedia.ca

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