That's true plus there's already a built in waiver. 75 percent of the league’s teams must play in metropolitan markets of at least 1,000,000 persons There are 50 MSAs in the US with greater than a million pop. Media markets are based on homes not population, unless you know differently.
Analyzing USSF PLS D1 Requirements: II. Division I Men’s Outdoor League: a. Composition; Play i. League must have a minimum of 12 teams to apply. By year three, the league must have a minimum of 14 teams. Not a problem for D1. ii. U.S.‐based teams must participate in all representative U.S. Soccer and CONCACAF competitions for which they are eligible. Not a problem. b. Markets; Stadia; and Fields i. U.S.‐based teams must be located in at least the Eastern, Central and Pacific time zones in the continental United States. (These three time zones are required because the majority of the large population centers are located in these time zones.) The west coast has a population of 54 million, the Midwest a population of 69 million and the east coast a population of 118 million, more than enough to sustain one team. ii. At least 75 percent of the league’s teams must play in metropolitan markets of at least 1,000,000 persons. Currently there are MLS teams in 28 of the 58 MSAs in the US and Canada with a population > 1 million. This rule allows for 7 teams in unique MSAs of less than 1 million. 3 independent USLC teams, 5 USL L1 teams and 3 NISA teams do not meet this requirement: USL Championship El Paso Colorado Springs Charleston USL L1 Omaha Chattanooga Greenville Tormenta Madison NISA Chattanooga Maryland New Amsterdam (The last two teams could relocate to a nearby population center. This happens in Germany all the time, but over stadium rather than population requirements). iii. League stadiums must meet the following parameters: 1. All stadiums/arenas must be enclosed. 2. All league stadiums must have a minimum seating capacity of 15,000. iv. Not later than 180 days prior to the start of each season, each team shall have a lease for at least one full season with its home stadium. Louisville built their 11,000 capacity (expandable to 15,304) downtown stadium for $65 million, so that's a rough estimate of the requirement. c. Financial Viability i. League must demonstrate adequate financial viability to ensure continued operation on a season‐by‐season basis either in the form of a performance bond or similar instrument for each team in the amount of one million US dollars (US $1,000,000), or readily‐available league funds representing such amount. The maximum amount of such funds for any league shall be twenty million US dollars (US $20,000,000) and will be used to cover the costs of the teams’ operations (including, without limitation, player and staff salaries and wages, stadium lease commitments and third party vendor obligations in addition to commitments by each team to the league) for a season, should that become necessary. Any team whose performance bond is used during the season will be required to replenish it at least 120 days prior to the next season. The bond is a great idea. If the EFL required a bond then Bury might still be around or at least wouldn't have disappeared mid- season. ii. Each team ownership group must demonstrate the financial capacity to operate the team for five years. As part of the process of demonstrating financial capacity, each ownership group must provide detailed financial history (if applicable) and projections (including a detailed budget) for the team to the Federation in a form satisfactory to the Federation. This prevents the repeat of the NASL, which was a top priority in the early 1990s when the PLS were originally drawn up. In addition, each team must have and its governing legal documents must designate one principal owner with a controlling interest who owns at least 35% of the team and has authority to bind the team. Such principal owner must have an individual net worth of at least forty million US dollars (US $40,000,000) exclusive of the value of his/her ownership in the league or team and his/her primary personal residence. The principal owner, together with all other owners, must have a combined individual net worth of at least seventy million US dollars (US $70,000,000) exclusive of the value of ownership interests in the league or team and primary personal residences. Federation shall have the right to require an independent audit to establish that the team meets these net worth requirements; the cost of such audit shall be the responsibility of the team or league. The Federation will take reasonable steps to protect from disclosure and limit access to financial information provided under this section. As I pointed out, there are tens of thousands of Americans worth more than $50 million. The owner could also be a company such as CFG, KSE, Red Bull or AEG, who are all listed as principal owners. This is a net worth requirement not a liquid asset requirement, so the principal owner is not expected to spend anything like that. d. Media i. League must have broadcast or cable television contract(s) that provide(s) for the telecasting of all regular season games as well as the championship game or series. For clarity, high‐quality internet streaming of regular season games satisfies this requirement. All pro leagues have this. e. Team Organization i. All of the required positions set forth in Section I(g) must be filled by full‐time staff year round. ii. Each U.S.‐based team must demonstrate a commitment to a player development program. This requirement may be satisfied by supporting either an amateur or professional reserve team competing in a USSF‐sanctioned league or by the league itself. iii. Each U.S.‐based team must maintain teams and a program to develop players at the youth level. This requirement may be satisfied by fielding teams in a Federation academy program. Most D1 and D2 teams meet this. f. League Operations i. In addition to the required positions set forth in Section I(e) filled by full‐time staff, the league office must have full‐time staff performing the functions of a chief operations officer, a chief financial officer and a director of marketing/public relations on a year‐round basis. Not a problem for a major league.
MD Bobcats are DC metro and New Amsterdam is in NYC. They’re just playing in Warwick due to COVID. It’s fine that there are as many rich people in the U.S. as you point out, but I don’t understand why they’re necessary for a successful amateur club to go pro. An expansion team, sure, but for a stable, operating club it seems unnecessary.
There's a cost to going pro. But I agree that $10M net worth for D3 does seem excessive, although if you could generate enough interest in an amateur team to attract investors or wouldn't be impossible. Detroit and Chattanooga FC have done pretty well. Dennis Crowley is probably right in saying that you'd need an extended USL2 or NPSL season to attract that level of interest. Fans could presumably start a holding company to own 35% of the team although 10,000 investors would have to fork out an average of $1,000 each. Has anyone in NISA appealed?
Yeah, I agree. Soctakes had an article a few years ago about how the amateur teams’ short seasons make it harder to get sponsors, keep community interest, etc. This is the space that NISA Nation intends to fill. We’ll see. Obviously there’s still an issue with player pool. They would need to partner with another league on this for it to go anywhere. I just don’t think they’re anywhere near ready to bother with that.
9 out of 11 starters from MLS and another who just left MLS defeated a bunch guys in a pro/rel league. Note: Just wanted make this post thread appropriate and say what a finish without saying all that.
True, but the vast majority of those players were "developed" in it while it was ... they've only had one season without it. .... or is the power of pro/rel so great, that getting rid of it sapped all of that development with it?
Pro/rel in Mexico is not like in the UK. I wouldn't be surprised if it returns with the top 10-12 or so clubs creating a single-entity, with a guaranteed D1 slot, and the rest being given guest spots with pro/rel.
But given that USA and Mexico have pretty much evenly split the Gold Cup (the difference being Canada’s one), I am going to have to conclude that pro/rel wasn’t much of a factor
Biggest difference in results came after MLS had been in play for a decade. Since '05 we're 5-4 up, have a 3-2 edge as runners up, and are behind 1-2 in the 3rd place game showing. But in "results" at the GC we're up by one overall. Given the overall numbers (for CONCACAF tourneys) that's a pretty heavy skew. MORE telling though, is the performance of other teams: Panama has been twice runners up in that time frame and also had two third place matches. Honduras had a stretch of making the third place match 4 of 5 tournaments Jamaica was runner up two tournaments in a row and followed that with a third place match Those countries results were directly due to MLS players (mostly).
I read somewhere, I think on Sportico, that SUM pays MLS around $175 million a year. Half of that obviously comes from the MLS TV deal in the US. I assume that Canadian TV rights are negotiated through SUM. Other SUM income comes from the Mexican fed plus CONCACAF and CONMEBOL events.
And a nice start to the season for Kelty - they won their first two games in League Two. Meanwhile relegated Brechin started with three wins in their first ever season at the fifth level of the Scottish pyramid.
I don't care. But I do care that England no longer has a representative in the Scottish Football League. I've always followed Berwick's score because they're based in England.
Always strange that someone feels the need to tell everyone by posting that they "don't care". Berwick got relegated to the Lowland League a couple of years ago. They may be based in England (just!) but their entire squad is Scottish. And, of course, you can still follow Berwick's score anyway.
Yo dawg I heard you liked pro/rel in your pro/rel leagues so here’s a story about pro/rel that features pro/rel.
To be honest Kelty were the Los Gigantes of the Lowland League, getting crowds of 500, about 5 or 6 times the rest of the league.
In the last (almost) covid free season - 2019/20 - only four of sixteen teams had attendances at or below a fifth of Kelty's average: https://www.nonleaguematters.co.uk/divisions/208/9/ Anyway, not sure what this has to do with anything. If we awarded promotion on the basis of attendance, Notts County wouldn't be pissing around in the National League.
https://www.epslsoccer.com/epsl-welcome-manhattan-celtic Manhattan Celtic appears to be the first merit-based promotion between separate leagues in US history. They were the 2nd place team in Cosmopolitan Soccer League, but Shamrocks turned down promotion to EPSL.
I suddenly felt a disturbance in this farce, as if 23,000 orange and blue voices suddenly cried out in terror....
Exclusive: UEFA to launch proposals next month for salary cap - and luxury tax for clubs who breach it - to replace FFP: https://t.co/kVRdsqLTz0— Martyn Ziegler (@martynziegler) August 12, 2021