Six ownership groups that were previously part of the USL-First Division have joined forces with St. Louis Soccer United to form a new professional soccer league that will begin play in 2010.
The Atlanta Silverbacks, Carolina Railhawks, Miami FC, Minnesota Thunder, Montreal Impact and Vancouver Whitecaps have joined St. Louis in an as-yet-unnamed league that has submitted an application for the sanctioning of the new league as a Division 2 league. The league will apply to be a Division 1 league in Canada.
“This is not your typical new league,” said Montreal owner and league chairman Joey Saputo. “Most of our teams have existed for years. We have united some of the best owners, teams and markets around a new vision for a professional soccer league in North America.
“We look forward to elevating our teams and league in order to give more opportunities to players, coaches, media and sponsors, entertain our fans and play our role in helping soccer truly recognize its potential in the United States and Canada.”
The application for recognition of the new league must still be approved by the U.S. Soccer Federation.
As for the USL, it will continue operation in 2010 with as many as 11 teams. Austin, Cleveland, New York, Puerto Rico, Portland, Rochester, Tampa Bay, Edmonton and Ottawa had representatives at a recent meeting to discuss the future of the USL, while Baltimore and Detroit were also represented.
What do you think of this news? Like the idea of a new league to rival the USL? Hoping these leagues work with MLS to improve player development? Plan on watching any of these teams play in 2010?
Share your thoughts below.
You have no clue…New York is probably the only city that comes close to the history of soccer in St. Louis. Do some research. They were playing soccer in St Louis when fur trading was the top industry in the PNW. Most of the 1950 WC team was from St Louis.
This seems like a bad idea. I think it will just diminish all levels below MLS. What will this mean for my hometown Charleston Battery?! I need my cheap beer on Friday’s before the match!
Division 1 is the top team in a multi-tier league
Division 2 is one step below in ranking and/or quality.
Usually the top 2 or three teams at the end of each season are promoted from Div 2 to Div 1.
Bottom teams in Div 1 are relegated ( de-moted ) to Div 2.
Stupid idea. Second tier soccer has to become regionalized in this country. Travel is going to eat up most of the budget of this new venture. We need a strong second level league that has 5-6 divisions, with the winners of each division going to a playoff of some kind to crown one champion. Would build local rivalries and cut back on travel.
What does it mean to be a “Division 1” league and a “Division 2” league?
Who’s that and what’s the St Louis connection?
Please
Ok I dug, I found StlouisUnited.com articles from last year when they were bidding to get into MLS.
They got burned. Even with Albert Pujols in the mix it hasn’t worked out. Even though it should have with the great rivalries they’d have from the get go.
Although I’m not convinced a brand new league is the answer, St Louis had better rule the roost if they succeed in forming the league. The fans need to show up in droves. Standing room only. And St Louis United will need to kick to the crap out of everybody in the first year and play better than Chicago or Seattle in their first year. And they should do it with homegrown players. They should win the Lamar Open Cup. They should win it for Lamar himself.
Otherwise its just talk.
I’d say the guy over at Hoffenheim who was lighting up the Bundesliga last year is a pretty big notch for St. Louis’ cred as a soccer mecca.
We’ve all been waiting for your opinion. We just got bored and tried to fill in the time with our own meager opinions…
Now please enlighten us so we can hear it and carry forth your words of wisdom into the world.
This is perfect for MLS, they can continue to pick up teams from USL and now this new league. I give it about Two more world cup cycles, MLS will pick the others clean until they have no choice but to join and be considered Division 2. MLS should have enough support to change into regulation/promotion and still keep the playoff system.
God Bless America!
Are we that hard up for pro/rel that we want to see it in a 6 team league?
Maybe Portland can finally win a soccer championship with both Seattle and Vancouver gone. Never mind I am sure they will find a way to screw up the post season
Attendence at the USL as little to do with getting an MLS team. Seattle drew 3-5K and many thought it would fail. The key issue is money. Need owners with money and stadium–See Roth and Allen for Seattle
Ottawa and Baltimore wouldn’t be “expansion teams” but would rather be “promoted” from PDL and USL-2, respectively, if they end up in the league, so they’re already part of the USL structure. Only FCNY and the Rowdies would be true expansion teams.
I am very suspicious of the research that shows Seattle has more adult participation than anywhere else. It is flawed because it only counts formal leagues, which tends to favor upper-class participation and excludes the main form of participation for most hispanic players. Adult pick-up games at the parks in Los Angeles run from dawn until dusk, but they don’t get counted.
Of course, pick-up games played doesn’t translate into season tickets sold, so it is understandable for a league and owner to factor only formal participation into locating a team. Nevertheless, it overstates the question of which city has the most actual participation.
in otherwords nothing more then a minor league team they can “loan” out their players from their MLS side….
hopefully TOA and MLS work something out to where this is a common practice
yea, you’ve had these teams for some time now…
I don’t know about any ties to MLS. One of the main reasons for the split is that in USL the league is owned by a third party and the TOA group feels that the league should be owned by the team owners themselves. This seams like it would be a significant stumbling block to any kind of partnership or association with MLS.
It’s very possible that the team/league ownership issue is a smoke screen and just a lot of talk, but I doubt it.
pros; st. louis has a professional team.
maybe the breakoff league can establish some better organization/player development
cons; are they going to play the same 6 teams all year?!? (not counting USOC)
basically there is a divide among the prior USL teams and now they can only play half of the teams they played in years past.
overall: eh, should have broken off with geography in mind, but we will see how different (better) this league is compared to the prior. Anything to shake up the current league system and move it to a more progressive international style i will listen too.
Mecca? Sorry, that’s a bit much. I have no doubt that it’s a soccer hot-spot, and that St. Louis has produced several top notch players, but you have two cities in the Pacific Northwest (Portland, Seattle) in which soccer is extremely popular. Seattle in particular has more adults playing the sport than any other city in the country. The level of adult participation in St. Louis is nowhere near that.
Find a history book (ok, might not have many but at least an article) on soccer in the U.S.
Recent history (especially at the top levels) has been lacking, but the city was a cradle for the game in it’s formative years in the U.S. and youth teams are still upper-tier.
Would love to see this league and MLS work together. MLS reserve teams could put farm teams in this league, owning rights to the players without hits to MLS salary caps, and with the rights to “call up” players anytime, for any game.
The main problem St. Louis has had with getting into MLS is that they haven’t had a 2nd or 3rd level team since 1995, so there’s no guarantee of financial stability yet. Does that mean they can’t be successful? No. Would having a Tier-2 team for a few years help them out? Absolutely. That’s why Portland and Vancouver ended up with the 2011 teams: not only is the PNW also a soccer hotbed, but all three of their USL teams have proven to be successful, so that makes them a safer bet than St. Louis, where the market is no sure bet.
But this is a higher level, so better soccer hopefully. And the silverbacks havent been playing for a few seasons now..
Why can’t the USL teams keep a team in USL when they move to MLS? With no reserve teams in MLS the USL team could be a feeder.
Look at lower league clubs like Oxford United and Oxford City. United send players to City to get experience. The same with Cambridge United and Cambridge City.
It’s true, but I think STL United is making due with what they have. They have the backing of AB-InBev with the donation of the soccer park on the Missouri side (huge, as the original plans were out in IL).
This will hopefully get the ball rolling and strengthen any future MLS bid. It’s definitely going to need a lot of organic growth, but it’s start at least.
I was thinking the same thing. The way it looks this would require a lot travel for the proposed teams since they pretty much span all of the US and Canada. With the financial woes the Thunder are facing, how are they going to afford the added travel costs of flying all over the US and Canada?
St Louis is not Mecca for soccer. North Carolina, California, and New Jersey have produced much more professional talent.
Both owners said that they will establish team in the TOA league when they will leave for MLS. Probably in Victoria/Edmonton/Abbotsford for Vancouver and in Quebec for Montreal.
So would this put: MLS on top, Breakoffs 2nd, USL 3rd? Confusion!
Does anybody want to know how I feel about all this?
Well said. If not “the Mecca” then surely nobody could argue that it is not one of the hot spots. I can’t understand why MLS has no team there.
Ottawa won’t be joining the USL any time soon. The stadium is years away, if it ever comes. There’s great opposition to the building of the stadium in Ottawa.
St. Louis is pretty much the Mecca of soccer in this country. It makes me sick that they have to form a below-MLS team when they should have been an original MLS city. It’s almost impossible to believe that two teams in Florida folded without St. Louis ever even getting a team in MLS.
Just another thing MLS has gotten wrong for 14 years, unreal.
What precedent do we have for 7 USL-D1 (tier 2) expansion sides in a single off-season? That’s a lot of new teams to try and bring into the fold.
I’d also suggest these are ‘rogue/rebel’ USL sides, not outcasts….they left the USL, not the other way round.
Why does it seem unlikely? They’re all in different markets and unreleated to the others. It would be different if USL and TOA were both trying to get into St. Louis, but that’s not the case.
Probably by poaching a couple USL-2 teams? Or expanding into new markets following next season…
Fantastic! St. Louis needs a team of some sort in some league… this is big news for the Midwest.
I guess the Charleston Battery are sticking it out in the USL?
Also, is it me or will the US Open Cup be much more interesting next year because of this?
The USL will have less established teams than the new league 5 for USL versus 6 for TOA.
In terms of credibility that’s a big deal.
And The USL may be as high as 11, but could also be as low as 7, and that includes 2 expansion franchises in NY and Tampa. Getting 6 expansion sides in one season seems very unlikely (7 if you count STL in TOA) at that , or any level.
There will probably be a bit of a painful readjustment process here, as I don’t think either league is going to be OK on its own. One or the other will go under. Might strengthen the second division in the long run.
Uh, these aren’t new teams…
I would venture to guess that they’ll try to get some type of partnership with MLS. As stated, two are already scheduled to go MLS, and STL United has been bidding for the past few years.
With the MLS reserve league gone, this could be a mechanism to farm out the young guys until they’re ready to play possibly. Once a team moves up to MLS, find a new partner to bring into the fold. I’m sure they could come up with something similar to that. But seeing those names on the list, it smells like something in the pot to get a foot in the door to MLS.
How is MN possibly to be included with this group. Doesn’t this drop the TOA’s credibility? http://is.gd/4OVkD
I’ll be checking out Silverbacks games.
Will there be promotion/relegation? Splitting between Canada is a lot of work.
Division I AND Division II soccer split between two countries is a lot of paperwork… are we seeing the UFL of soccer?
Vancouver is joining MLS in 2011, and Montreal will probably be joining as well in the not too distant future. How is this league supposed to stay afloat once it’s two flag ship teams abandon it?
“Some of the best owners,” huh? For those of us watching the MN meltdown, that rings a little hollow. Really hope that the Thunder continue to exist, but it’s not looking good at the moment. . . .
What an awful idea…and of course Saputo is part of it. The United States can barely support one major league, and USL/MISL/etc are constantly bleeding cash. They need to unite as one league, not some 6-team joke.
Finally! We now have some teams in the south east! No more travelling to DC or Texas for decent soccer!