Cavalry FC celebrating with the CPL Shield on October 7, 2023, where they clinched the 2023 Regular Season Title, securing a into the Concacaf Champions Cup tournament for the first time in ever club history
Photo credit: Tony Lewis of Pro Sport Foto
Overview
The 2023 Canadian Premier League Regular Season was a monumental run for the Cavalry Football Club (or Cavalry FC) of Calgary, Alberta.
Around July-August of 2023, the team was projected to clinch a playoff berth to the CPL Playoffs as well as claim the Regular Season title (formally known as the 2023 Canadian Premier League Shield Winners), which was a brand new trophy unveiled for the Regular Season.
The other element was this: it was the first year ever in CPL history that a team would land a qualification spot to the Concacaf Champions Cup for winning the regular season.
The Problem
As graphic designer, I was tasked to create visuals for Cavalry FC to tell this story in a way online that would make sense to Cavalry FC’s fanbase, most of which was relatively new to the regional Concacaf football* scene - myself included.
Please note that the “football”I am referring to here is “soccer”. I say “football” as that is the most widely used and accepted term globally. Any references made to “American Football” will be stated as such.
The Solution
CPL Regular Season Winners
I got started on preparing the assets as soon as the possibility arose in July 2023.
The first set of graphics were for declaring Cavalry FC as “the 2023 CPL Shield Winners” (a.k.a Regular Season Winners) for all mediums (this included website, email, and social media).
I was inspired by other graphics that I had seen on social media put out by the Lionesses (England’s Women’s National Team) and other major sporting teams and events going on that utilize the team pyramid. This had been a project I had always wanted to tackle in my career and now, the opportunity had presented itself.
I wanted to be on top of this project as much as I could, but due to the ever-changing nature of sport competition, I couldn’t get too ahead of myself, so after every victory the lads had, I would work on these graphics little by little.
This included going through all available photos from past matches, placing potential images in as placeholders to essentially see if the images together were able to compliment each other and balance out.
It was tricky at times because some players had to be swapped out and removed due to trades, player sales, and late-season player signings, which is the nature of the business at the end of the day.
I had to made the working file in a way where the layout was fluid and I didn’t apply cutouts or photo edits until I knew for certain it was about to become a close reality.
Concacaf Champions Cup - Coming Soon to 2024
I highly stress the importance of building those relationships with your coworkers.
I would not have been able to get the graphics done without their help, especially when it came to the general understanding as well as the proper acquisition of photos from Concacaf and the CPL.
This was another aspect of the football world I had to learn through the various formal and casual conversations I had with my coworkers. Through these conversations, as well as additional research of studying the Concacaf qualification rules, the overall summary I got was this:
“We want to show the world that Cavalry FC isn’t just a wannabe bigshot football club. We are actually a big deal because we are in the same tournament as Inter Miami CF, the current club home to Lionel Messi, who is currently considered one of the greatest footballers in the world.”
Former Cavalry FC midfielder Ben Fisk (who also worked with us in the office) - who now works at CPL team Vancouver FC - said it best: “There’s something magical about the way Lionel Messi plays; he’s that good. If I were to ever line up against him, I would honestly be starstruck.”
'Starstruck', huh? That word stuck with me.
It would be like Usain Bolt coming to run the 100m dash at Foothills Athletic Park or Eliud Kipchoge competing in the Calgary Marathon.
Another word that was thrown out during these casual conversations was “movie poster”. A common theme that you see with movie posters is the “coming soon to 20XX”. Having seen the two biggest movies of the summer “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer”, reviewing the format and layout of these particular posters, as well as others, such as Marvel and DC movies, were my primary sources of inspiration.
Music was also a big driver for me when it came to designing the mood I wanted to convey from the design. The song I had on-repeat (not even kidding about this) was “Nothing is Lost (You Give Me Strength)” by The Weeknd from James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water.
The initial concept was probably the hardest. I knew that it needed to feature our players front and centre without question. One of the asks that caused me the most amount of stress on the project was the inclusion of Lionel Messi in our graphics.
After expressing my concerns of NOT resorting to pulling photos from Google Search, my coworkers were able to help me out with this request by obtaining the photos of the players in the proper way, which makes me even more proud of this work.
I can proudly say this design was literally a team effort.
Concacaf Qualifiers
Out of all the graphics made, this series was the most straightforward to build.
I had a few references provided from Concacaf and from other qualified teams that I was able to refer to in building our own assets for Cavalry FC’s channels.
The images I referred to for inspiration and reference were below and my task was to essentially build them in Cavalry FC’s existing campaign brand for the season as well as the inclusion of the Cavalry FC crest logo in the Qualified Clubs graphics (my coworkers came in clutch for me in helping me receive the tournament logos properly from Concacaf.)
The only thing I would change about the final graphic is the celebration photo being in colour rather than black & white.
Click the image to view the post on Instagram!
Concacaf’s Version of the Qualified Graphic
The following day after we shared out the sequence of graphics announcing ourselves CPL Shield Winners as well as our own Concacaf Champions Cup qualified graphics, Concacaf put out their own version of the qualified graphics on the "@thechampions" social media platforms.
Although I was not responsible for the creation of the graphic, I was responsible for providing them the photos to use. Initially in the ask, my coworkers said “action shots”, but in all honesty, it seemed weird. I provided action shots of the boys celebrating during the match.
The images that ended up being featured were of Sergio Camargo, Jesse Daley, Daan Klomp, and Myer Bevan.
I am very happy with how the graphic turned out in the end and I was also very excited to have a part to play in terms of providing them the photos we wanted them to use on behalf of Cavalry FC.
Takeaways
This was the first time I had to create a series of “Clinched” graphics to this scale. Although it was executed successfully, it wasn’t perfect and there were definitely some takeaways from this project that I was able to learn going forward.
The biggest thing that made this successful was involving my colleagues early on in the creative process, both designer and non-designer. I was able to express the relevant considerations and concerns that arose throughout the design process to the folks that needed to know in a way they could understand, even if they had no technical knowledge or understanding on design itself.
For example, when it came to building the CPL Regular Season Winners, I was consulting with Cavalry FC's Head Coach & General Manager Tommy Wheeldon Jr. on the preferred prominence of players that needed to be present in the layout.
Another example was working with my Graphics colleagues on the balance of all the players and the coach together in the composition.
Closing Remarks
A lot of people see graphic designers as wizards, magicians, or gurus that can make anything happen.
But as designers, if we take the time to involve our coworkers in ways that are relevant to them and can be understood at the surface, it will make your life easier at the end of the day.
Having support and empathy from your coworkers, especially from those that are NOT designers, is the best thing you could ever ask for in a workplace environment.
