With the 2020 USL Championship season delayed (at a minimum) and a venue that relies on the large crowds now prohibited due to the pandemic, Bobby Epstein’s staff reductions at COTA include Roberto Silva, general manager of Austin Bold FC (and before that, the Austin Aztex).
We are still a year away from watching our city’s first major league team take the pitch, yet Austin FC has already charted an ambitious start. For those of you that have followed sports in Austin over the last few decades, you know that securing a stadium has been the largest hurdle for any professional sports organization searching for sustainable success.
Austin FC has not only secured a stadium site, and inside Austin’s city limits at that, they have broken … Read the rest “Unquestionable Ambition”
Soccer supporters in Austin have chased the game all over town, this past decade:
Some of these are clearly better than others. House Park has a certain shabby-chic 1930s charm, but the high-school football fields generally were very, very far from ideal. The … Read the rest “Austin Soccer Stadiums Past, Present, & Future”
Sunday evening was a beautiful one for soccer at Bold Stadium at the Circuit of The Americas. And the teams put on a good show in a regular-season USL match that happened to have a little extra on the line. By the time the final whistle blew, Austin Bold FC had won Copa Tejas with 3-0 victory over Rio Grande Valley FC:
… Read the rest “Austin Bold FC Win Inaugural Copa Tejas”Austin Bold FC won the Copa Tejas at Bold Stadium after a 3-0 win over local rivals
Interesting article in the Houston Chronicle last week, wondering why the established team there isn’t better supported: Dynamo know they should be bigger in Houston:
… Read the rest “Houston Chronicle: Why Aren’t the Dynamo Bigger?”Attendance issues have mirrored the club’s on-field struggles. After ranking in the top 10 from 2006-15 and placing fourth as recently as 2012, the Dynamo fell to 17th in 2017. According to the Sports Business Journal, the Dynamo only topped five teams in 2018 average attendance in early August.
An Aug. 3 match between
From coverage of this week’s MLS announcement in the Austin Chronicle (¡Dale, Austin FC! MLS Makes It Official), some interesting comments from a council members Garza and Casar:
… Read the rest “Council Looks Forward to Community Benefits from Austin FC”After the event, Mayor Pro Tem Garza and CM Casar echoed Adler’s declaration that Austin FC could act as a kind of existential unifying force throughout the city. Garza pointed to her childhood in San Antonio, where Spurs fandom stretched across class lines, and Casar recalled PTA meetings where parents
by Chris G.
I heard this on one of my regular podcasts today and I thought the hosts, Tyler Kern and Steve Davis, put it simply and clearly. They were discussing today’s Big Announcement (from about the 26th minute of this episode):
… Read the rest “Austin FC, No Question”Kern: Can I say something about this? Because I saw someone that I follow on Twitter that I like, that said something to the effect of, “How can the fans in Austin really celebrate this knowing that
by Chris G.
I hated Orlando after the Aztex (“1.0”) moved there. I hated Orlando a lot. I wished nothing but the worst for that team, top to bottom. I wanted that owner and his greedy and misguided plans to not just fail, but to fail spectacularly. Here’s a bit of what I wrote at the time on my blog, The Aztexan:
… Read the rest “Relocation Grudges Past & Future”I hope Orlando The City Beautiful City Soccer City Club SC or whatever the fuck
by Lee Nichols
One of my favorite sayings is “the perfect is the enemy of the good.”
I usually apply it to politics, when I’m annoyed at those who demand ideological purity and refuse to consider a candidate who is actually electable.
I think it may apply to our Major League Soccer stadium search, as well.
On Tuesday, City of Austin staff released a map of public properties that might be used for the Columbus Crew if the team relocates … Read the rest “My Stadium Pick: McKalla Place”
Not long ago, supporters of professional soccer in Austin had little hope for a team, and certainly nothing tangible on the horizon. But as we near the end of 2017, the story of local pro soccer is riveting.
In addition to Bobby Epstein’s announcement that USL would return to our city in 2019, we have also had the seismic news that Anthony Precourt is considering relocating MLS’s Columbus Crew to Austin to begin play that very same year. We have … Read the rest “A Suddenly Crowded Stadium Scene”