Chris Duffin has always done it the hard way. After all, he's an Aston Villa fan.

But he's enthused about the Canadian Premier League, particularly the correlation between local communities and the development of the domestic game. It's why he set up Northern Corridor, a York United FC Supporters' Group that has big plans for the upcoming CPL campaign.

Duffin - like so many - had grown up a fervent hockey fan. But, over time, he began to drift away from the sport, increasingly disillusioned with the direction it was taking. He wanted to feel invested in something again and a chance meeting with a football-obsessive proved crucial to him fostering a new-found passion.

"It became very generic and repetitive and copycat," he says.

"I grew up in a hockey-loving family and I just got bored. The team I followed - the Detroit Red Wings - won four championships and the players I cheered for when I was younger started to retire. Suddenly, I didn't feel like I had that connection anymore. I was looking for something else. Football hadn't been on my radar but I had a customer from the UK, a born-and-raised Manchester City fan - right through the dark days. She'd always want to talk about the game so I decided I'd look into it. The sport was on the periphery here and we didn't have much of a strong domestic presence so I picked up with an English club. I wanted to earn it. It was too easy to cheer for Liverpool or Man United or Chelsea - the clubs loaded with money and perennial winners. There's no joy in that. I learned that from hockey. If you've had the struggle, it means so much more when you're successful. So, I started following Aston Villa the same season they were relegated."

By the time Duffin and his wife moved back to their native York Region, his love for the game had really taken off and it dovetailed with the emergence of the country's new pro league. With a local club now right on his doorstep, it was the perfect opportunity to impart some of the inspiration he'd gleaned from those years supporting Villa from afar. And, pretty quickly, Northern Corridor was born.

"I feel very strongly about the community - it's my home, where I'm from and where my family is raised," he says.

"It meant a lot to me. There is that grassroots thing. It's a professional league but not a place for millionaires. It's a living wage. And that's important because some people have a disconnect with the money some people make in certain high-level sports. When the rebrand happened, it was important to grow the club by acknowledging the Toronto market and the opportunities that exist there. But I didn't want the York Region connection to disappear so I was thrilled when 'The Nine Stripes' was kept within the new identity of the club. As someone from the region, I really loved the concept of representing each municipality but I also found that there's a bit of a geographical divide. If you go north of Richmond Hill, there's a little gap until you hit Aurora and a bunch of communities all together: a northern section of the region, basically. I felt it was a good time to create something and see if it helped with building some momentum."

However, 2020 arrived and so did a global pandemic. It's meant Duffin is still waiting to attend his first game at York Lions Stadium. But, the enforced break has ensured a chance to get planning. And he's got plenty of ideas.

"For this league, an away day is difficult to manage for us, unless it's Forge," he says.

"But being able to get a group together when the team is on the road and head to a local pub on match-day...there's nothing like it. I like the idea of creating an inviting environment and fans meeting up - some from Aurora or Newmarket or King City. We're not excluding anyone, just trying to find a way of regionalizing it. For home games, we can get together on match-day, arrive at the same time and have our own little march to the stadium."

"I'd like it to have enough of a family atmosphere that it's somewhere you can bring your kids. The next generation of fans is going to be the most important one. My five-year-old will grow up watching this club live. His first experience in a stadium will be a York United game. He will have that connection always and I'm trying to get it across to him that he could - one day - be playing for the team and that there's a path right there for him. Being able to involve that next generation in a supporters' club and capturing their imaginations and hearts is gonna be a big part of it."

So, how much is he looking forward to the 2021 home opener?

Duffin takes a deep breath.

"Oh...I can imagine the smell of match-day," he says.

"Sitting in the stadium in the open air on a Friday evening at dusk and watching the lights come on. It really still is a dream. It's been so long now. The anticipation is massive."

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