so San Jose gets the Spurtz 7/17. Red Bull gets Man City and Juventus and Sporting Lisbon. 7/22-25. Rapids gots nothings so far. Hope this changes. soon.
In addition to the friendly cup that forced the move of the Rapids game in Chicago they're also playing AC Milan later in the season.
Earlier in the thread we discussed that one of the reasons other teams could get these friendlies but we couldn't is that they were large cities that could sell bunches of tickets. San Jose is going to play Tottenham at Buck Shaw though, which only holds 10K. I think the Rapids could get 10K for Tottenham or another similar team.
the Arsenal partnership probably kills any Tottenham friendlies, unfortunately. But sheesh, teams willing to play for 10k, partner club granted. And we cant muster even a Borussia Mönchengladbach.
I thought the Everton game had a pretty decent crowd for a somewhat obscure English team playing in the middle of the US. If Arsenal play here I could imagine a sellout.
There's now a thread tracking the list of all the friendlies in N&A. So far 5 MLS teams (NE, Chicago, DC, SJ, and NY) as well as Montreal have announced friendlies against notable European teams (AC Milan, PSG, Juventus, Fiorentina, Tottenham, Man City, Benfica). There's also going to be a Rangers-Celtic game at Foxboro. DC is also working on matches against Blackburn, one of the Glasgow teams, and El Salvador. Rapids, ball's in your court. Looks like plenty of teams are going to be in the States, you should be able to get at least one of them to come out to the Dick. My vote would be for Blackburn.
Earlier on in this thread there were complaints regarding the Everton match, now Blackburn! If the drawing power is between Blackburn & Free Dipping Dots the Rapids would do well to offer the later. If a significant side with drawing power cannot be bought for Denver then the idea of the match should be abandoned in favor of plan B.
Hey, I said it was my vote, not the best move. Of course I am biased being a Rovers fan (and I had no complaints about Everton, I enjoyed that game)
If Everton is considered obscure, maybe they shouldn't go after club teams at all and stick to national teams. Everton is one of the inner "big five" clubs that pushed for the Premier league.
Boca Juniors to LA Galaxy. 5/23. Maybe we will announce another girls high school tournament to energize our base.
I personally would love to see a friendly with the Rapids held at Folsom Field one day... It would be a cool venue for a soccer match. Right up against the mountains looks pretty good-- Just imagine it's a soccer pitch
Goff is tweeting that Celtic and Boca Juniors will also be playing the Sounders. So now over half of the rest of the MLS teams have friendlies lined up against notable European clubs (or in LA's case, a notable South American club). Rapids FO, got anything for us?
Hey gang, its not so bad! Maybe, if nothing else materializes, we can use our bonus tickets for a Mammoth game! That would be so rad! (then f--king shoot me. or just gas the whole stadium with me in it.) I want to see some quality live soccer, a honking big team to come in here and energize the slumbering soccer fans. Not some lame ass Azerbaijan Nats or cellar dwelling Bundesleaguers. An all mexican super liga match would not be half bad either. But frankly the waiting game is wearing me down, to where I will soon be glad to see another visit from the Chinese National team (or even Blackburn and Milwall). I imagine the RFO know that and are waiting for us to reach the groveling point to spring some lost and confused roadtripping Serie B team on us. If it was gonna be great, i think they would have already blown their own horns. Of course this is the team that didnt even let Rapids/soccer fans know that Zinedine Zidane would be visiting the "worlds largest soccer complex". Couldnt capitalize on one of the greatest soccer players of all time visiting their stadium. So who knows who is coming, if at all.
I'd rather see the Rapids play Blackburn or Milwall than a Superliga match. (In fact, giving us the chance to use our bonus tickets on a match in a tournament we would have qualified for if we had won any of our last 7 games last season would be insulting IMO)
That event was the doings of ESPN. I'm not sure if the Rapids or DSG had any approval to make a public media event out of it.
As the people renting the fields to ESPN, KSE (at some level) had the ability to use Zidane for promotional purposes. Choosing not to may have been a good move (ESPN refused to use the Dick unless KSE agreed) or a bad move (KSE decided that Zidane wasn't worth the effort). My guess is that it was another dropped ball by KSE, but there's no guarantee because it wasn't a KSE event.
Doing so would allow KSE to benefit financially from Zidane. I seriously doubt that would be a given by default. I would like to see proof KSE had that ability. Yes, I know blame KSE first is your default option
At the very least they had the ability to include it as a stipulation of the contract that ESPN signed to use the fields. Again, it may have been a deal-breaker for ESPN and if so, I can't fault KSE for going ahead anyway. But, as the operator of the fields, there was some point in the process that KSE could have negotiated for the right to capitalize on his visit. We won't know if choosing not to was a good or bad idea unless KSE wants to open the files for us.