Why American Soccer is Entering the Major Leagues

As the self-proclaimed inventors of football, us Brits tend to laugh at and deride our American cousins when it comes to 'soccer', but the creation and maintenance of their flagship franchise Major League Soccer should be a source of inspiration to us amongst our own financial peril.

USA was granted the 1994 FIFA World Cup under the agreement that they would establish a long-term professional league. A move that was no-doubt fueled by FIFA's willingness to open the soccer market up to the richest country on the planet, with previous attempts of fading superstars, like George Best who played for the San Jose Earthquakes in 1980, joining their amateur ranks at the end of their careers being largely fruitless.

MLS was the result and many see its success being owed to very strict controls on transfers and salaries since its inception in 1996. Focus was placed on home-grown talent, so much so that by the end of the first season of MLS, which was won by D.C. United, soccer had more registered native players than any other professional sport.

The 2010 season of the MLS began a month ago, and attendances are for the first time averaging above other American favourites NBA (basketball) and NHL (ice hockey), leaving soccer the 3rd most attended sport in the USA behind NFL (American football) and MLB (baseball). Basketball and hockey fans would eagerly point out the size limitations their stadiums impose on numbers but there is more to this shift than just physical boundaries and the David Beckham effect.

This shift can be best illustrated by the highest averaging team in the MLS, at 36,153 average last month, the Seattle Sounders. Following the relocation of their basketball team the Sonics to Oklahoma, a struggling Seahawks NFL side and their baseball team the Mariners becoming the first ever NFL team in history to have a $100m payroll and lose 100 games, it seems that Seattle's sporting fans are eager to back a winner, after they won last years US Open Cup.

USA's national soccer team has reached every World Cup Finals since 1990, even reaching the last 8 in Japan/Korea in 2002. And with their Confederations Cup Runners-up place last year adding to their strong bid to stage the 2018 World Cup finals; perhaps we will see the rest of the nation following Seattle's lead and the USA could become the footballing powerhouse that we have always hoped/feared.