City politicians have a year to figure out how to build a stadium.
It seems that the United Soccer League is looking to put a franchise wherever there is a plot of empty land. The latest city that is the target of the league’s affection is Fresno, California. Fresno politicians have taken the first step in an attempt to lure a women’s team and a men’s team to the town by signing an exclusive agreement with the United Soccer League “to explore building a downtown soccer-specific stadium and bringing a franchise to the Central Valley.”
Fresno Mayor Jerry Dyer said the city has entered into a one-year exclusivity and due diligence period with the USL in an attempt to bring various levels of professional soccer to Fresno. The city has to find a stadium site and figure out funding options. Then the city has to find an ownership group. Dyer said the stadium would seat around 7,000 people with an opportunity of expanding in the future. The United Soccer League is in a major expansion mode. The United Soccer League plans to go “major league”. The USL has been around since 2011 and has been considered a minor league or Division II grouping by the United States Soccer Federation. The USL has 25 franchises, most of them are in smaller markets which would not necessarily be considered major league markets. The league has some franchises in big-league markets including Indianapolis, Las Vegas, Miami, New York, Oakland, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, Sacramento, San Antonio and the Tampa Bay area. Fresno would not fit into the “major league” expansion. But it fits into another USL niche. Smaller cities getting lower-level franchises once a new stadium is built. Albany, New York, Omaha, Nebraska and Reno, Nevada plan to build stadium-villages for the lower-level USL league. Political leaders think the stadiums will be catalysts for economic development especially with a village surrounding the stadiums.
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