Soccer in Cincinnati

[Caveat Emperor]

Aw, I didn't realize the field wasn't wide enough. I've sat in the seats you speak of when Marshall played there and was appalled by how terrible they were. No big loss. As for the football markings, Seattle is one example of a stadium that readily removes and adds markings for MLS/NFL. So it can definitely be done and the football liens would only have to be a concern for part of the season.

Either way, I'm thinking about throwing down a deposit for seasons. Tickets in the supporters section (North Endzone) are only $120 -- which is less than $10 per match.

[Chip R]

Is the surface going to be an issue? Most football teams seem to be going to some kind of fake grass but most soccer teams (excepting the Women's World Cup) play on grass.

[reds1869]

Is the surface going to be an issue? Most football teams seem to be going to some kind of fake grass but most soccer teams (excepting the Women's World Cup) play on grass.

Several MLS teams play on artificial surfaces and synthetic grass is catching on overseas. Grass is always preferable but turf isn't a death knell. In the long term they said they will have a field at Nippert made specifically for the club. In the short term they have said they will at least not play on a field with football lines.

http://www.cincinnati.com/story/spor...nati/31529207/

[Chip R]

Several MLS teams play on artificial surfaces and synthetic grass is catching on overseas. Grass is always preferable but turf isn't a death knell. In the long term they said they will have a field at Nippert made specifically for the club. In the short term they have said they will at least not play on a field with football lines.

http://www.cincinnati.com/story/spor...nati/31529207/

I was driving home after I l m posted this and Mo Egger had someone on - I think it was Tuberville - and he seemed quite adamant that there wouldn't be any football lines on the soccer field and vice versa. I'm wondering how they will pull that off.

[Caveat Emperor]

I was driving home after I l m posted this and Mo Egger had someone on - I think it was Tuberville - and he seemed quite adamant that there wouldn't be any football lines on the soccer field and vice versa. I'm wondering how they will pull that off.

There's a special type of paint you can use for FieldTurf that will stand up to rain but then dissolve and disappear if power-washed with a certain type of chemical -- I know Seattle uses it to switch CenturyLink field for the Sounders and the Seahawks.

The only real issue is that I think it takes a full 24 hours to flip the field (remove one set of lines, let the field dry, put down a new set of lines), and that's caused the Sounders issues once or twice where they had to play with football lines still down on the field. I suspect it won't be much of an issue here because of the short overlap between the two seasons.

[IslandRed]

I thought I read somewhere that the Nippert stay would be temporary, as USL wants all its teams to have a soccer-specific facility by the end of the decade or somesuch. Is that still the case?

[reds1869]

I thought I read somewhere that the Nippert stay would be temporary, as USL wants all its teams to have a soccer-specific facility by the end of the decade or somesuch. Is that still the case?

That is what USL has been saying, but the rate at which they are expanding might make that impossible.

[Caveat Emperor]

That is what USL has been saying, but the rate at which they are expanding might make that impossible.

They kept bringing up the rate of expansion during the press conference yesterday, and it kinda made me cringe. Stability is usually the sign you're looking for from a sports league -- rapid movement in one way (expansion) or another (contraction) usually doesn't end well.

[Yachtzee]

They kept bringing up the rate of expansion during the press conference yesterday, and it kinda made me cringe. Stability is usually the sign you're looking for from a sports league -- rapid movement in one way (expansion) or another (contraction) usually doesn't end well.

Well, it should be interesting to say the least. It sounds like FC Cincinnati has some deep pockets behind it, a central location, and even thought it will be a tenant of UC's football stadium, the idea is to follow Seattle's lead and paint over the football lines for soccer games so as to avoid having the confusing football lines marking up the turf. If Cincinnati soccer fans come out and provide support for the team, there's no reason why they can't jump on the bandwagon for MLS expansion, if the league grows to 30 teams, or be in a good position for Division 2 soccer, whether that be NASL or a USL 2nd Division league down the road. But I think ideally they should focus on building a strong basis for the team at the current level. If Lindner and some of the other backers are coming in and expecting to instantly have a situation like they have in Sacramento, San Antonio, or Minnesota, they may be disappointed, and if they don't have the patience to build a following and show a commitment to the city and the sport, the effect on pro soccer in Cincinnati could be devastating.

All in all, I really hope FC Cincinnati succeeds, although I wish they would have come up with something a little more imaginative. Personally, I think replacing the winged lion with a winged pig and calling the team FC Porkopolis would have instantly given them some strong appeal with the locals and name recognition not just locally but nationally. I imagine they would get jersey orders from all over. I would put in my order today for that shirt.

On a side note, John Harkes is coming to town, Cincinnati. Watch out for your wives and daughters.

[Caveat Emperor]

Well, it should be interesting to say the least. It sounds like FC Cincinnati has some deep pockets behind it, a central location, and even thought it will be a tenant of UC's football stadium, the idea is to follow Seattle's lead and paint over the football lines for soccer games so as to avoid having the confusing football lines marking up the turf. If Cincinnati soccer fans come out and provide support for the team, there's no reason why they can't jump on the bandwagon for MLS expansion, if the league grows to 30 teams, or be in a good position for Division 2 soccer, whether that be NASL or a USL 2nd Division league down the road. But I think ideally they should focus on building a strong basis for the team at the current level. If Lindner and some of the other backers are coming in and expecting to instantly have a situation like they have in Sacramento, San Antonio, or Minnesota, they may be disappointed, and if they don't have the patience to build a following and show a commitment to the city and the sport, the effect on pro soccer in Cincinnati could be devastating.

All in all, I really hope FC Cincinnati succeeds, although I wish they would have come up with something a little more imaginative. Personally, I think replacing the winged lion with a winged pig and calling the team FC Porkopolis would have instantly given them some strong appeal with the locals and name recognition not just locally but nationally. I imagine they would get jersey orders from all over. I would put in my order today for that shirt.

On a side note, John Harkes is coming to town, Cincinnati. Watch out for your wives and daughters.

I just don't have a great handle on how big the market for soccer is in Cincinnati. The Cincinnati Saints have been something of a dud, but I think they've made a lot of missteps thus far -- many of them directly related to not having any kind of budget for marketing or facilities. To that end, I know a lot of people in town who were surprised they were actually considered a "professional" team. They've certainly never had a day of attention paid to them anywhere near what FCC had yesterday (front page of Cincinnati Enquirer print edition, full Cincinnati media contingent covering).

Cincinnati does a good number for USMNT soccer in terms of TV ratings, and it's frequently in the top 10-15 markets for EPL soccer. But, on the other hand -- as excited as I am personally about FC Cincinnati, I just don't get the sense there's (say) 10,000 people ready to put down for tickets to a minor league ANYTHING in Cincinnati,to say nothing of soccer. Cincinnati is decidedly a "major league sports" city -- and I think part of the reason they're already playing up the MLS thing is to convince the town that there's a clear goal of being major league.

I'd love to be wrong -- desperately so. I would love to show up for Week 1 in 2016 and find Nippert packed with 15,000 people and have it stay packed for years to come. But, I just don't know that it's there yet.

[Yachtzee]

I just don't have a great handle on how big the market for soccer is in Cincinnati. The Cincinnati Saints have been something of a dud, but I think they've made a lot of missteps thus far -- many of them directly related to not having any kind of budget for marketing or facilities. To that end, I know a lot of people in town who were surprised they were actually considered a "professional" team. They've certainly never had a day of attention paid to them anywhere near what FCC had yesterday (front page of Cincinnati Enquirer print edition, full Cincinnati media contingent covering).

Cincinnati does a good number for USMNT soccer in terms of TV ratings, and it's frequently in the top 10-15 markets for EPL soccer. But, on the other hand -- as excited as I am personally about FC Cincinnati, I just don't get the sense there's (say) 10,000 people ready to put down for tickets to a minor league ANYTHING in Cincinnati,to say nothing of soccer. Cincinnati is decidedly a "major league sports" city -- and I think part of the reason they're already playing up the MLS thing is to convince the town that there's a clear goal of being major league.

I'd love to be wrong -- desperately so. I would love to show up for Week 1 in 2016 and find Nippert packed with 15,000 people and have it stay packed for years to come. But, I just don't know that it's there yet.

And I think the problem here is perception as far as where you think attendance for a USL or an NPSL team should be. USL is currently our 3rd tier on the Soccer Pyramid. Average attendance is 3,266 this season. Most teams in the USL play in stadiums, some of them built by the teams themselves, to seat 3,000 to 8,000 fans. The best team in the league, attendance-wise, is Sacramento Republic, and their stadium only sits 11,500. So packing Nippert with 15,000 on opening day and averaging 10,000 fans a game at the USL level would probably put FC Cincinnati at the top of the list for MLS Expansion and amaze the hell out of anyone. In fact, those numbers would also probably put you atop the NASL, the current 2nd Division league, which is currently averaging around 6,500 a game. In fact, if you look at England, The Football League 1 is their 3rd division league and the average attendance for 2014/15 was just over 7,000 a game.

The reality is that, if FC Cincinnati pulls between 5,000-3,000 people a game it should be considered a success. If their business model is to average 10,000 a game, they will fail. Now pulling 3,000 people for Division 3 soccer is nothing to shake a stick at. If I had the time, I would guess that in most countries that aren't England, 3,000 a game for Division 3 soccer is a very strong showing.

As far as the Cincinnati Saint go, I'm not sure what you expect really. The NPSL is a semi-pro league where most of the players are either college kids, who don't get paid lest they lose eligibility, or reserve players from NASL or USL teams that are on loan to get some experience. USSF only officially recognizes 3 divisions, so anything below is sort of an unofficial 4th or 5th tier and in England would be considered the equivalent of Non-League Football (meaning the leagues and teams are not a part of the Football League. In England there are hundreds of teams playing Non-League Football and their attendances tend to be counted in the Hundreds rather than Thousands. So the fact that the Saints even have a regular supporters group that shows up for games and cheers the team on is amazing in itself.

Another way to keep things into perspective regarding FC Cincinnati attendance is to remember that, if you look at attendance figures for Minor League Baseball, FC Cincinnati is coming it at the AA level. Even the best AA teams don't draw 10,000 a game. The Cincinnati Saints would be the equivalent of a rookie league team or even the Florence Freedom in Independent League ball.

[BuckeyeRed27]

http://www.worldfootball.net/attenda...e-2014-2015/1/

Here is the attendance table for League One last year. Average was about 7k, but that is skewed a bit by Sheffield's 20k.

[reds1869]

For those of you that are interested, there is already a pretty active supporters forum.

https://www.reddit.com/r/FCCincinnati/

[Caveat Emperor]

And I think the problem here is perception as far as where you think attendance for a USL or an NPSL team should be. USL is currently our 3rd tier on the Soccer Pyramid. Average attendance is 3,266 this season. Most teams in the USL play in stadiums, some of them built by the teams themselves, to seat 3,000 to 8,000 fans. The best team in the league, attendance-wise, is Sacramento Republic, and their stadium only sits 11,500. So packing Nippert with 15,000 on opening day and averaging 10,000 fans a game at the USL level would probably put FC Cincinnati at the top of the list for MLS Expansion and amaze the hell out of anyone. In fact, those numbers would also probably put you atop the NASL, the current 2nd Division league, which is currently averaging around 6,500 a game. In fact, if you look at England, The Football League 1 is their 3rd division league and the average attendance for 2014/15 was just over 7,000 a game.

The reality is that, if FC Cincinnati pulls between 5,000-3,000 people a game it should be considered a success. If their business model is to average 10,000 a game, they will fail. Now pulling 3,000 people for Division 3 soccer is nothing to shake a stick at. If I had the time, I would guess that in most countries that aren't England, 3,000 a game for Division 3 soccer is a very strong showing.

I don't think their business model requires that they pull 10k per match, but if they want to be a leader in the league, that's the gold-standard number IMO. I've looked over the figures, and I see no reason why Cincinnati shouldn't be shooting for a number north of 8k per game. Indy, Sacramento, and Minnesota are all drawing that -- no reason that Cincinnati shouldn't be able to be in that same range given how comparable it is to those cities in size, competition for sports dollars, and general makeup.

It does also bring up a problem with choosing Nippert as a venue -- you could be doing really well and drawing 7-8k per game and the place will feel like a ghost town with all the empty seats. That's not great when you're trying to sell the atmosphere and matchday experience.

Either way, I put my deposit in last night, so they've only got 9,998 tickets left to sell.

[Yachtzee]

I don't think their business model requires that they pull 10k per match, but if they want to be a leader in the league, that's the gold-standard number IMO. I've looked over the figures, and I see no reason why Cincinnati shouldn't be shooting for a number north of 8k per game. Indy, Sacramento, and Minnesota are all drawing that -- no reason that Cincinnati shouldn't be able to be in that same range given how comparable it is to those cities in size, competition for sports dollars, and general makeup.

It does also bring up a problem with choosing Nippert as a venue -- you could be doing really well and drawing 7-8k per game and the place will feel like a ghost town with all the empty seats. That's not great when you're trying to sell the atmosphere and matchday experience.

Either way, I put my deposit in last night, so they've only got 9,998 tickets left to sell.

I think the key is to make sure they give people a positive experience. On the plus side, it sounds like their team has people with both experience in soccer and experience in the Cincinnati sports market, although the one soccer guy involved is Mark McCullers. He used to work for the Crew and is the one responsible for negotiating the TV deal with TWCableSportsNet that makes it impossible for people in Columbus to watch the Crew on TV unless they subscribe to TWC and includes a 75 mile blackout so that non-TWC subscribers can't even subscribe to the MLS Direct Kick package to watch games or watch them onlline. Hopefully he's learned from that mistake. Someone already made the joke of FC Cincinnati having a 75 mile YouTube blackout (USL matches are available on You Tube).

I hope you enjoy the season next year. It should be exciting. I keep contemplating University of Akron season tickets, as that is the closest soccer team for me and they have a very good program there. I usually take my son to 1-2 games a season as it is.