Forever First: Forge's Kyle Bekker retires as CPL legend after 8 years as face of the league

November, 2018.

Kyle Bekker, part of the very first cast of players to sign in the Canadian Premier League, said in an interview that he wanted to change the narrative for Canadian youth players.

At 28 years old, Bekker had seen the ups and downs of trying to make it as a Canadian in North America. He had 18 caps for the national team, but he'd played for five different clubs in the past five years. Major League Soccer stints in Toronto, Montreal and Dallas had left him frustrated.

Enter Forge FC, and the fledgling CPL.

“What we want is to bring in a Canadian-heavy team that has the talent that people think that Canadians don’t have,” Bekker said at the time. “We’re going to put a nice image on the pitch, and we’re going to be successful, and we’re going to do this time and time again to keep proving everyone wrong.”

He added: “We have this talent in our backyard. We just have to take the time to actually care for it and not freak out and go away from everything we should be, which is a Canadian-dominant league.”

Eight years on from the day Bekker signed in Hamilton, he retires as an indisputable legend of the league he helped build.

Now 36 years old, Bekker – in his own words – leaves his Forge FC shirt in a better place than he found it. He has captained the club to four CPL championships and two CPL Shields.

Bekker wore the jersey 239 times. He played in five CPL Finals, and led his team in eight different countries as Forge campaigned across Concacaf. 

He has been nominated for CPL Player of the Year six times, and won it in 2020. His peers voted him in the top 10 for Players' Player of the Year every single season the award has been handed out (four times).

With 25 goals, 32 assists and 25 yellow cards in all competitions with Forge, Bekker has been at the centre of almost every single memorable moment the club has. He shook hands with Manny Aparicio before kickoff of the CPL’s first ever match. He lifted the North Star Shield in Calgary as the league’s first champion. He did so again in Prince Edward Island a year later, when Forge rose above the rest at the Island Games.

When Forge needed goals in Panama and Costa Rica in the 2021 Concacaf League, Bekker provided. When Forge marched out at the Estadio Azteca in the Concacaf Champions Cup, Bekker led them out.

When the CPL unveiled a new trophy for its playoff champion, Bekker was first to lift it.

Bekker has appeared in 90 per cent of the matches Forge have ever played, and no player has represented a single CPL club more than he has. He became the first CPL Centurion in 2022 when he played his 100th game, and he remains Forge's all-time appearances leader.

For eight years, Bekker was Forge FC. That’s why Bobby Smyrniotis has repeatedly called him the club’s “heart and soul.”

Smyrniotis has also pointed out, however, that Bekker is an archetype of player that the CPL exists to serve. He has often discussed what he sees as the main categories of Canadian players that needed the league.

There are the youngsters – the players taking their first steps in the professional game, looking to develop and move on to a new level. There are the veterans, perhaps ex-CanMNT stars, who want to finish their careers at home.

Then there are the lifers. They're the backbone of CPL rosters, the core players who may have started in the league, or might have found a home here after years playing abroad.

Those are the players who set the standards at their club year in and year out. They help build the professional environment that can uplift the sport in this country.

Bekker fits in both of the latter two boxes. At the time he arrived in the CPL, he had something of a journeyman career. Instead of continuing to jump around, possibly finding another opportunity in MLS, he returned to Canada to become a legend for a brand new club.

"He’s the standard-bearer of what it takes to be a successful player in this league," Smyrniotis said in 2022.

Bekker set out in 2018 to provide an example for young Canadian players who might finally grow up in a world of opportunity. In a way, he wanted to ensure that the next Kyle Bekker might avoid the gauntlet of his early career.

This week, Bekker sat down with CPLsoccer.com and reflected on his career. He recalled the pressure he put on himself, not just to perform on the pitch, but to stay firm to his commitment to setting an example.

"When I came back here, I was buying into something that was bigger than myself," he said, "but at the same time, I knew that I had to hold myself to a standard that was higher – just to make sure that I'm not living on some false expectation or reputation that maybe someone has, and I don't live up to that. For me, that was never in the question. I had to go out and I had to prove myself. Being a young guy coming back and buying into something like this, you don't know what you're going to get, and I didn't want to fall short."

Bekker certainly didn't fall short.

If, one day, there's a Canadian Premier League Hall of Fame, Bekker would undoubtedly be the first player inducted. In fact, considering the impact he had on building Canada's domestic league, he should probably be a Canada Soccer Hall of Famer.

Not that Bekker himself would suggest anything like that, of course.

When asked if he feels like he accomplished what he set out to do, Bekker defers, saying that's for others to decide.

To him, there's just one thing he can say.

"The one thing I will say is I gave everything I had," Bekker offered.

"Whether I was right, whether I was wrong, whether I should have done it one way or the other way, what I know to be true is that I simply gave everything. 

"My only hope is that the people of the city, the people across this country saw it."