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Big decisions loom for growing MLS
Major League Soccer shows plenty of signs of good health and progress but beneath the surface the North American league has some critical decisions to make over its future direction.
After a week of largely upbeat build-up and nationwide publicity for a sport that so often struggles to get space, the league’s title deciding game, MLS Cup, was played out in front of over 46,000 fans here in Seattle – the city that is staking a strong claim to be the de facto home of U.S soccer.
“It was a memorable night for soccer in the United States,” said league commissioner Don Garber.
Strolling through the squares of downtown Seattle, packed with fans bedecked in team colours and chatting to the soccer-savvy locals, it was hard not to imagine how the sports scene in the U.S could change if the Seattle experience truly was replicated across the country.
David Beckham and L.A Galaxy didn’t get their title, losing on penalties to Real Salt Lake, but they did both earn some respect.
Beckham has surely put to bed the argument that he is not fully committed to his MLS project by playing through the pain barrier of a badly bruised ankle for 120 minutes and since Bruce Arena took over as head coach, the Galaxy feel like a real team rather than the circus act they were in danger of becoming.
Salt Lake won the league in just their fifth season of existence – a real boost for the trio of new teams about to enter MLS, Philadelphia in 2010, Vancouver and Portland a year later and encouraging also for other teams in the league without a big name foreign player.
Don Garber Q & A
The following is the transcript of an interview with Don Garber, commissioner of Major League Soccer. Simon Evans talked to Garber as he marked his 10th year in charge of the league.
Commissioner, are you where you expected to be after ten years in the job?
When I first took this job, I thought it might be just about turning the lights on and all of a sudden soccer would get in a position to explode. Over the last decade I have realized that there is tremendous potential for this sport but still enormous challenges – we work on those challenges every day and I am really empowered by how big the opportunity is. But I don’t believe that even in 1999 that I expected that the sport would be as popular as it is today – the games that have taken place over the last few weeks of this summer, I think, are almost unprecedented in American sport. We have had several million people at soccer matches – many were MLS matches, many were international matches against MLS clubs.
We had 93,000 on Saturday night at the Rose Bowl which is the largest crowd in the United States since the 1994 World Cup. In many ways the sport has grown in ways I never believed it could have. But we do recognize that for MLS to benefit from the popularity of the sport we really need to work hard at converting all of these soccer fans into being very committed MLS fans – that is a process that is ongoing and I think will continue to take a long time.
The crowd that stood out for me, although it was not the biggest one, was the 70,000 plus in Baltimore for a friendly. The challenge is obvious I suppose, how do you attract in people like that to MLS? How do you get people without a local affinity to an MLS team to watch the league on television? This may sound like Commissioner-speak but the largest crowds this summer have included MLS teams – this very interested soccer audience is not just interested in seeing two teams play an exhibition and then go home. They are also interested in seeing those teams play against MLS clubs. There will probably be around 70,000 for Seattle against Barcelona on Wednesday and at the press conference with the Barca coach there was talk about how this would be the first game (on Barca’s tour) where the large majority of the fans will be dressed in green and cheering on the home team – and the Barca coach thought that was great. That just shows that when things get put together the right way, the formula does work.
That formula is working in Seattle, we have a perfect storm here of very passionate fans, deeply committed MLS fans, the Sounders matter in this market, they are very relevant and more relevant than any international club. It is part of the process of working hard on that conversion, having the right brand, having the right facility and the right players on the field.
Let’s take the case though of the 30 year old guy who went out to that game in Baltimore, he watches international soccer on television and sometimes MLS, he had a great time at that game, he goes home, he hasn’t got a team in Baltimore. With your expansion plan being step-by-step, how do you expand the game into those areas where there is obviously a huge appetite for the game?
Jeff you do realize WHY Miami FC and the Marlins do not draw many fans don’t you? Miami FC, up until very recently, has done no marketing, and plays in a market where many fans follow big international sides. The Marlins suffer from a bad stadium(currently), many rain delays and hot temps. New ballpark with A/C=normal MLB fans. Portland and Montréal are better fits for USL, it’s why they draw so well. Limited major league competition in those towns allows for USL to prosper. Look at other big cities with USL history, Toronto, Atlanta… all horrible USL support(Seattle wasn’t the best either). Toronto and Seattle now get 20,000+ every game for MLS. The Fusion were mishandled by ownership and the league and were prematurely disbanded. Dallas or KC could easily have been folded instead if the league was in such dire condition. Those two still struggle to draw fans.
MLS needs to be in South Florida. Whether it’s a team actually in Miami this time(Fusion) or back in Ft. Lauderdale(bring back the Strikers!) it must happen.
it sure sounds like socialism to me. Soccer in Europe is a free market game where those without money and a powerful fan base, are left behind. The worst team in MLS will be back next year and the year after that no matter how pathetic they are. That is the premise of socialism Fred; that the strong and the weak have access to the same resources and compensation is based on the amount of labour expended. MLS is a socialist league if it’s anything like you described.