The New York Red Bulls will open their new stadium, Red Bull Arena, on March 20 with a friendly against legendary Brazilian club Santos FC.
The Red Bulls had been scheduled to open play at Red Bull Arena in their MLS season opener, on March 27 against the Chicago Fire, but the friendly vs. Santos should provide an enticing first match for the large Brazilian population that lives in the area near Harrison, New Jersey.
Santos is best known as the club that Pele made famous, though there has been no word on whether Pele will be in attendance for the Red Bulls-Santos match. Pele famously ended his playing career in a testimonial match between Santos and the New York Cosmos at Giants Stadium in 1977.
What do you think of this development? Plan on attending the first match at the new stadium? Disappointed the Red Bulls didn't keep the MLS season opener as the first match at the stadium?
Share your thoughts below.
Verrrrrrrrrry tempted to grab the girlfriend and use a weekend in NY to see this…. Hmmmmm….
As a season ticket holder, I don’t like the idea. I wish they had kept the MLS opener as the opener. Instead, the stadium will be at least half full of Brazilians who don’t give a crap about MLS or RBNY.
Will be there for the season opener and more
WHY THE HELL would you want the Brazilians to go back?!?! Brazilian women are THE BEST!!
i got an email and these tickets are included with the season tickets.
How about the rest of the MLS season schedule? Any word on that being released?
anyway, I’m only talking about access (early purchase, similar to the “Stage is set” 2 ticket pack). I do not expect games like this to be in the package. When they only give you one Pub pass a season, you certainly do not expect extra games.
Darn! I was hoping the Fire would be the first team to beat the Pink Cows at home. Well, nice enough to be the second.
Wait til they tear up the turf to set up a concert stage. The Miller Party Deck at Toyota Park won’t seem so garrish.
why not? Half season got me both Barca games, US-Mex and US-Arg. I support the team as much as I can (and it wasn’t easy last year…)
if you care about the game enough to post about it, you should already have season tickets. support your club, man.
Jan 28th
Any ideas on tickets for the MLS opener? I will be in NYC for my bachelor party that weekend, and would LOVE to go to RBA for the game.
Also, Ives, if you want to buy your favorite poster and his buddies a round of beers, feel free!
They need to use that game to sell season tickets, or half/partial.
Does anyone know if that will be on TV ? In Seattle ?
Get the CBA signed, so we can start counting the minutes until the season starts
I will keep QWest, even though no one calls it SSS.
Enjoy.
There is a huge Brazilian/Portuguese population in Newark (and tons of Brazilians in NYC), so booking Santos not only means getting a great club with a storied history but also makes tremendous sense given the market. A worthy way to open what is MLS’ first destintation stadium. Good job RBNY.
Looking forward to the match. I remember the last time Santos came to play (in Giant’s Stadium) a few years ago against Rangers (think it was one of those double headers after a Metrostars match). Santos’ team included Robinho, Diego, Alex and co and just ran circles around Rangers (this was just before the start of the season when the team brought up many of those players from their youth team and then went on to with the Brazilian Championship that season) . The final score ended with Santos wining 1-0, but that scoreline in no way reflects just how dominant Santos were in the game (and just how much fun they were to watch).
I would of been there but without a job, can’t afford the plane tickets, so I’m doing the next best thing in my effort to support MLS attendance, I bought my nephew tickets to go with his friends!
I was the HDC too Erik, remember Pele was there for that one! I got lucky we sat behind the south goal at Home Depot, where I never sit but that time, I got to shake Pele’s hand because after he performed his openning ceremony cameo, he went around the ring of the bottom row and shook a lot of the fans’ hands!
I’m with BrianK, this is a good move for the staff to indeed get the opener right when it’s televised on national television.
Is this going to be on TV?
This is great news:
1. Santos guarantees the presence of Pele,…which would be huge news for Red Bulls and the Arena.
2. A Brazilian team will make Paul Gardner happy!!
3. It makes sense to have a friendly before the MLS opener so the staff can work the operational kinks out. Kudos to Eric Stover.
I will be at both matches,…in my front row seats.
I have my tickets for the Home opener against Chicago and will definitely go to this game to. Can’t wait to see this new stadium in person!!
I can actually top that…I’m coming all the way from LA for this game. Man, I’m going to love my east coast trip in March.
as a season ticket holder, this game is included… yup ill be there..
Coming from south Florida for this game…CAN’T WAIT
no way! I wanted to see the chicago fire, not the skill & flair of Santos! (sarcasm)
When do the tickets go on sale? does anyone know?
You mean they couldn’t land a super club for their first game? Weak!!! J/k
yes, SBI keeps em coming fast and furious. He is intent on world domination. I spend so much time reading here that I forget the addresses of other soccer news websites. Perhaps they should take out an anti-trust suit against SBI. Anyway, is NYRB going to sign Santos? That would be interesting to just sign most of their team (keep Juan Pablo Angel, though).” Then we’d be talking”
At the moment Santos has a game on the 21st so it looks like we are getting the reserve squad which is not a bad thing so looking forward to it since it’s a freebie for STH’s.
Everything is possible in one game. On the other hand, the Red Bulls would not survive a season in the Serie B.
Right, if Dallas can hang with Atlético Paranaense, then i think the score will not be 13-2.
One can only hope.
Looking forward to the game. Be a nice way for the Red Bulls and their stadium staff to have a dress rehearsal for the real deal against Chicago.
Ives, Any word on how season tix sales are progressing? Sounds like they haven’t even sold out the lower tier yet.
I dunno.
The inaugural game? One that they’ll probably lose?
I like the idea of the game, just not as the first one.
Ives,
Don’t be afraid to start posting a real picture of the arena. It really is there and it is not a dream anymore. The Red Bulls have moved past the cartoon stadium mock up. There is a nice shot of the arena on the NYRB website.
It looks like this venue will get lots of use. Which is very exciting since it is by far the best SSS ever built in this country.
(SBI-Just didn’t have a live shot to use. Hopefully I’ll add one soon. I know it’s real, I’ve seen it a hundred times already. Place is beautiful.)
No disrespect I hope the MLS does better they could amaze me I just think the quality isn’t good enough to match a club like Santos right now but in the future I believe it is possible.
Maybe things are turning around in New York. Maybe they will continue this trend of actually making good decisions.
When do the tickets go on sale? Estrela brasileira, nao concordo com voce.
This could be a good match however the Red Bulls will probably be annihilated Brazilian style my projection 13-2 Santos (2 goals scored after they pull off their 3rd string squad.)Should be entertaining for the fans these clubs generally play fairly well.
Great idea. Love it
I guess i might have to make it a full week long trip up to NYC!!!
I like that stadium because it really can be called ‘soccer specific’. So many of the SSS’s have some sort of stage in place of one stand and are still called soccer specific. But this one is the real deal.
I hope Neymar plays
Will be there!!!
Oh yeah I’m there! It is included as part of the ST package. It would be awesome to have Pele show up.
This is gonna be brilliant, I may just have to spring break to NYC for this!
half season packages are on sale already? I’ve been waiting for those.
You don’t even want to ge every Red Bull game and you want a friendly to be part of half season plan? Keep dreaming
Access to this game had better be part of the half season ticket package. Pele was at the first NJ Ironmen game too.
Good idea….maybe some Brazilians will want to go back
Fantastic news. Hopefully Pele will make an appearance as he did for the first Red Bulls match in 2007.
Wow….updates are coming fast and furious today. When I first read the headline, I was thinking Santos from Mexico. Very nice “get” for the RedBulls.