European Attitudes to American Soccer

[reds4ever]

Originally posted by DanS

Who would have thought that a town like Columbus, Ohio could support a soccer team so well, for instance.

Believe it or not a friend of mine used to play for Columbus Crew, he got cut when they limited the amount of foriegners allowed in any one team.

[DanS]

How is that countering that attendance isn't that great?

Like you say...

It's a good number and will sustain a league

And that's what fits for the US market. We will end up with 20 or 30 stadiums that hold 20,000 to 30,000 fans. The more established teams may be able to able to fill bigger stadiums consistently. The college soccer game may start to fill up the undercard, so to speak.

This may not sound like much, but aside from the biggest Euro teams, these kind of numbers are rather respectable.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by DanS
And that's what fits for the US market. We will end up with 20 or 30 stadiums that hold 20,000 to 30,000 fans. The more established teams may be able to able to fill bigger stadiums consistently. The college soccer game may start to fill up the undercard, so to speak.

This may not sound like much, but aside from the biggest Euro teams, these kind of numbers are rather respectable.

Yes, but our teams don't sell out their stadiums . Ever watch an MLS game on ESPN2... looks like no one is there. In order to be world beaters, as you were implying earlier, that attendance isn't good enough. It doesn't show enough committment to the game. Right now the attendance is good enough for a niche sport, but that won't get you that far in world competition.

Most teams in Europe's top divisions have over 30,000 seats and the smaller parks are sold out. In the US, our smaller stadiums usually are not sold out. LA is our success story in attendance, but they average 21,000 in a park that can hold 27,000 (the Home Depot Center).

[Az]

Yeah, 20-30k are ok, I guess, ( but only for 2-3rd tier euro teams). However TV viewers, and TV revenues are much larger in europe, it seems.

[Agathon]

Demographics and immigration will ensure that soccer has a future in the US. In fact it will overtake other sports. – it's just too big

[reds4ever]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui


. LA is our success story in attendance, but they average 21,000 in a park that can hold 27,000 (the Home Depot Center).

Because of the high Hispanic population?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Agathon
Demographics and immigration will ensure that soccer has a future in the US. In fact it will overtake other sports. – it's just too big

Hopefully... the incoming Latino population, however, perfers to focus on the Mexican Soccer League rather than MLS. We'll see if we can tap into those fans.

And a lot of European immigrants focus on European squads rather than MLS ones.

The MLS needs to reach to those fans more, but I'm not sure how.

[DanS]

Originally posted by reds4ever


Believe it or not a friend of mine used to play for Columbus Crew, he got cut when they limited the amount of foriegners allowed in any one team.

That's cool. Maybe as the number of teams grows they'll be able to take on more foreign players.

Columbus is a good example of what is possible. It's a pretty small town. A little over a million people, including suburbs. They built a soccer-specific stadium that has a capacity of 22,500 with an option to expand to 30,000. $10 - $17 for a ticket. American-style concessions and the like (we like our brews and brats, as Colon alludes to ).

They've found a formula that works in economic terms for the US. Columbus is the 34th largest TV market in the US.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by reds4ever
Because of the high Hispanic population?

Ya... but a high Hispanic population isn't always a recipe for success. FC Dallas is in a high Hispanic location, but only draws 11,000 fans a game.

LA has been such a succes, a new team was put in the city called Chivas USA... which is owned by the owner (Vergara) that owns Chivas in Mexico. It's a transparant ploy to get Hispanic fans of Mexican soccer interested in MLS .

They seem to be doing as well as LA (the Galaxy) in attendance so far this season.

Dallas is still languishing.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by DanS
That's cool. Maybe as the number of teams grows they'll be able to take on more foreign players.

Columbus is a good example of what is possible. It's a pretty small town. A little over a million people, including suburbs. They built a soccer-specific stadium that has a capacity of 22,500 with an option to expand to 30,000. $10 - $17 for a ticket. American-style concessions and the like (we like our brews and brats, as Colon alludes to ).

They've found a formula that works in economic terms for the US.

Being a successful league is one thing (and I think the MLS is one, even though it is still losing money). Having a league that produces players that can dominate on the world stage enough so the US becomes a major player in international soccer is something else entirely.

[reds4ever]

Does the MLS have a draft/salary cap or is the system more along coventional lines?

[Agathon]

The domestic league will follow international success.

The US tends to ignore sports that they get beat at. That's doubly so for sports that communists would have thrashed them at during the Cold War.

[Imran Siddiqui]

MLS has what it calls the SuperDraft, which drafts American college players and foriegn players that MLS has gotten the rights to. The MLS is still mostly a single league structure (where the salaries are with the MLS and players leased out to teams... kind of).

There is a salary cap, and IIRC, it's $250,000 base salary with $100,000 in bonuses. Though they bent the rules for Adu who is making close to $500,000 somehow (it has been suggested that most is under the table).

[Hueij]

I'm wondering how games will mix with tv commercials?

[lightblue]

What it'll need is the possibility to get relegated out of the MLS. If there's no risk to being a **** team, any team that's not going to win the championship won't be supported very well as there'll be no real point. The relegation batles in Premier League are always sell outs, the fans they can make a difference with their support.

Also I don't reckon the college _> draft system is going to work if you want to develop players that will succeed internationally. You want academies attached to teams getting the local kids in.