Scorpions v. Railhawks this Saturday

Wow, 10K. That is really good.

There is a club in Detroit this year, Detroit City FC. They are a semi-pro team in the NPSL. They have been gaining a lot of popularity as the season went on. They average about 1,500 but from what I have read/heard, they are a very loud, enthusiastic 1,500. They play at a high-school football field int he city of Detroit (pretty close to downtown).

This is the way soccer will build in this country, situations like San Antonio and Detroit. MLS is nice if you live in one of the areas where they have a team, but that leaves a lot of the country unserved. There has to be opportunities for people to go to games and get their own team to adopt. It might not be the best quality soccer at first but it will get better.

 

A 1-0 victory in April is not what I would call mincemeat. Should they be scared now that the scorps have Cunningham? Not really. I admit, the Railhawks record away from home is shite. But don't think it's not to be a good match. I'm not saying I see a win for the Railhawks, but I don't see one for the Scorpions either.

 

Dave you are so right about how to build soccer. Cleveland had a team in USL div 2. They played downtown and had around 2,000 (stadium's capacity) at most matches. They came in second their first year and then won the league their second year so USL moved them up to div 1, bloviating on about how Cleveland was a model for other USL teams. In USL 1 they demanded a larger capacity stadium so they moved out to a high school in the burbs. It was a failure and USL turned their backs on us. Now we have no team. They messed with something good, in it's infancy and then felt no responsibility for what their meddling did. :angry-banghead: They should have just left the team alone.

Cleveland now has a NPSL team like Detroit but it's been started by totally different people and I never hear anything about them.

What I really believe is wrong is US soccer dismissing high school, and eventually college, soccer. I know there are serious issues there and I fully understand them. But growing soccer in this country depends on it's popularity with the fans, and our schools have a built in network of fans. As an example, I saw the highlights of the US Soccer Development Academy national finals in which FC Dallas' U18 team won the championship. It was whisper quiet in the stadium and these were our U18 marquee teams playing in Houston's brand new soccer specific stadium. Contrast that with the crowd at our local high school's last game in the district finals. It was an away match and our fans were so loud, despite us losing 4 - 0, that the home fans actually tried to stop our kids from playing their instruments and singing. It was an unforgettable experience that any kid would want to be a part of. No one, other than the players' parents, attends or cares about a Development Academy game yet the DA is US soccer's answer to improving (and they think growing) the sport in the US.

Sorry for the high-jack.

 

I'm not going to lie, it was so bad I couldn't even make it through the whole match. I knew it was over after the red card on Austen King. I'm not too big to admit that I was wrong about SAS. They are a force to be reckoned with. For now......

See you guys at Wake Med in September.

 

Redemption. Tonight was about redemption and finally winning an away match outside of Atlanta. Congrats on the first round bye. Hopefully we will see you in the playoffs.