ISAC CAMBAS BROUGHT SOCCER TO THE PORTUGUESE COMMUNITY
Isac Cambas loved the game so much he once owned a team and called it after himself. But not to steal the spotlight, he reversed his first name to call the amateur soccer team Casi Soccer Club.
Cambas learned all about football growing up supporting Porto, one of Portugal’s top sides and one of the leading teams of Europe. On arrival in Canada he soon became an established member of the soccer community, entering a stage called the Goan Soccer League, one of many amateur leagues playing attractive soccer and governed by the Toronto Soccer Association. It was humble football beginnings in Canada for sure, eventually leading to a life of soccer that kept the semi-professional and the professional game central to the Portuguese community in Southern Ontario following the demise of the First Portuguese team in the 1990s.
Isac Cambas died on March 1, following a battle with cancer diagnosed in the summer of 2018. He was 56.
Cambas was instrumental in the formation of the Puma League, which launched in 1995 as an ethnically-based concept appealing to Toronto’s growing diverse community. His team, Portuguese United, moved to the professional Canadian National Soccer League in 1996 to be known as Toronto Supra. In 1997 the CNSL was renamed the Canadian Professional Soccer League (CPSL) and following a period in amateur soccer, Cambas in 2001 entered Toronto Supra as an expansion franchise in the pro CPSL. His team was later named Portuguese FC which in 2011 merged with SC Toronto which became the Portuguese entity in soccer until 2013. The club is now in amateur soccer with broad programs for player development and competition with various age groups.
Tony Camacho, who also followed a similar path from Portugal to Canada to become one of Canada’s top soccer referees, earning the coveted FIFA badge in 1992, has held various top level positions as a match official administrator and is presently leading a long-term developmental program to increase Canada’s high level match officials, spoke recently of Cambas: “Isac loved the game and it showed in his willingness to discuss the laws of the game as well as controversial referee calls and he was interested in an improved standard of officiating. Always pleasant and open to discussion”, he said.
Dragan Bakoc, president of the Canadian Soccer League in which Isac Cambas was an equity owner for 13 years, commented: “I am saddened by the loss of Isac, a colleague and friend for many years and a great member of the soccer community. He was generous in the game and signed up several players who turned out to be outstanding at higher levels. A nice man, and from the CSL our condolences go to his family and his many friends.”
Danny Amaral, one of the CSL’s top players over the years with several seasons at a high level in Portugal and Spain and now head coach of Portugal AC of Canada’s Premier Arena Soccer League, explained recently how Isac Cambas brought local soccer to the Portuguese community and kept the Portuguese teams in Southern Ontario in the spotlight. “Isac was a credit to soccer in Canada and the Portuguese community here, a hard worker and generous in many ways. He’ll be missed,” said Amaral.