And really - don't give us the "well that option currently exists....." - out of interest - how many NEW players have people met IN GAME on COH2 and added to their friends list?
I can tell you mine is ZERO.
Once a game is over - most people just go look for the next match or shutdown - they don't hang about to chat - and that's the problem, unless A LOT of your friends are RTS types, you'll often have no use for the custom system in place.
While I sort of agree with your basic points, I've got 6 or 7 steam friends from it, one of whom I play 2v2s with semi-regularly.