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November 12, 2005
Soccer Reaches the Tipping Point
When we heard that a web site called Football Stadium Digest had an interesting column on MLS, we figured it was a European site that had taken notice of the league. After all, the U.S. is playing Scotland later on this morning and this sort of story would make a good sidebar to the pre-game reports.
Well, it turns out that Football Stadium Digest spends most of its time focusing on stadia that teams like the Raiders and 49ers play in. That makes it even more remarkable that they've got a story about how soccer is finally reaching a tipping point in America.
As Mark Abbott, chief operating officer of MLS observes, the timing makes sense. "Those kids [from the 1970s] are now forty years old or even slightly older, and they are beginning to take positions of influence throughout American society. In politics, in the media…we didn't see that five years ago. They are now influencers in important organizations that can help the sport grow."
The author, Glen Strandberg, notes that tomorrow's MLS Cup will be played in a new stadium and that more are on the way:
So while soccer fans look forward to this weekend's MLS Cup between the Los Angeles Galaxy and the New England Revolution, there are plenty of other reasons to celebrate. A prime example showcasing soccer's growth resides in where the championship game is being played: in a beautiful stadium built specifically for soccer. It's not the first, and it will certainly not be the last.
On Sunday, November 13, the city of Frisco, Texas will host the game's biggest event in the brand new Pizza Hut Park. The 21,193-seat stadium just opened in August, but if that's not startling enough – a huge soccer complex in football crazed Texas – it will not hold its Guinness-like status for long.
In 2007, the Colorado Rapids will open their very own sports park and eclipse the size of the one outside Dallas. And these stadiums, those that have preceded them, and the ones that will follow, have everything you could imagine.
"The way I think about these facilities is that they are what you would expect to see in an American NFL stadium, but shrunk down," Abbott says. "They have all the amenities you would want when you go out to a modern sports facility."
Times have most certainly changed. Not only are these venues being built, but they are being built with public funds. Simon Borg, MLS Media Relations Director, illustrates just how far soccer has come. "It's significant when communities are knocking on our door, saying, ‘We want soccer.'"
Soccer has long been promoted as "the sport of the future" here in the U.S. and criticized for not living up to that potential. What happens if that future is today? When a publication that normally focuses on NFL stadia casts an admiring glance at American soccer, there are clearly big changes occurring.
Posted by Jay at November 12, 2005 06:33 AM