A brief history of Major League Soccer, the highest level of professional Soccer in the United States and Canada. Mike Nyerges
Major League Soccer commissioner Don Garber takes questions from supporters of Futbol Club Cincinnati, Tuesday, Nov. 29, 2016, at the Woodward Theater in Over-the-Rhine. (Photo: The Enquirer/Kareem Elgazzar)
About 16 months removed from the official start of Futbol Club Cincinnati's expansion bid for Major League Soccer, many fans are left to wonder where the club is at in the process.
There aren't a lot of easy answers around the expansion process at this point, although FC Cincinnati threw fans and observers a bone Wednesday via a statement.
That statement gave a rough description of what the club still needs to accomplish, and what might be giving MLS reservations about before it gains the long-sought bid to join America's top soccer league.
Here's an overview of where things stand:
What FC Cincinnati's saying about its expansion situation: The aforementioned midweek statement laid out FC Cincinnati's situation in slightly vague but still telling language. No deadline was discussed, but FC Cincinnati noted it needed to finalize "various legal agreements with the City (of Cincinnati), Port, County and (Cincinnati Public Schools) and an assessment of our interim MLS Nippert Stadium plan – before our bid will be 100 percent complete for final review."
That was FC Cincinnati telling you there's still some important pieces of work to get done.
What MLS is saying: While MLS executives likely would have signed off on several aspects of FC Cincinnati's midweek expansion update, the statement can't be directly attributed to the league. But what the league has said about FC Cincinnati in recent weeks and months has been positive. FC Cincinnati has twice been singled out in league updates on the expansion front for positive reasons.
The league said in February it had made the most expansion progress in Cincinnati.
In mid-April, MLS spoke relatively extensively on FC Cincinnati's stadium progress in another statement.
MLS expansion finalists in Detroit and Sacramento received what read like a courtesy mention in the same statements. No specific details about their respective bids were included by the league. It's highly significant that the heavily-scrutinized statements from the league office speak glowingly of FC Cincinnati and say almost nothing about the other expansion finalists.
MLS is trying to clue you, the FC Cincinnati fan, in on what's happening. What they're trying to tell you is that they view Cincinnati as the leader in this round of expansion but still can't firmly commit to FC Cincinnati.
And why can't they commit to FC Cincinnati? See the midweek statement the club released Wednesday.
Detroit and Sacramento remain in the game, but FC Cincinnati's position remains strong.
What are the pundits and other media-types saying? After FC Cincinnati received votes from the necessary governing bodies to further its quest for a stadium, the social media buzz around the club was very positive. Many speculated Cincinnati's expansion bid was no longer a question of "if," but had re-entered "when" territory.
ESPN personality Taylor Twellman isn't necessarily an objective voice on the subject (he emceed MLS Commissioner Don Garber's public visit to Cincinnati in November 2016), but Twellman still said during a recent match broadcast that he'd be shocked if FC Cincinnati wasn't admitted to the league within a few weeks.
Leading experts on expansion and MLS outside the city continue to view FC Cincinnati is nearing the bid.
What's next in the expansion process? FC Cincinnati is more than likely working through the legal issues it said needed to be addressed with various authorities that are relevant to the stadium project. Should the club succeed in reaching agreements with all those parties, MLS would likely announce a not-so-subtle "major soccer announcement" to take place at some kind of landmark venue around town. The league would surely decline to comment on the subject of the announcement, but history would clearly indicate that announcement would be one confirming FC Cincinnati for MLS.
If all that were to take place expediently, FC Cincinnati could still begin to play in MLS for 2019, although each day that passes makes that increasingly unlikely.
Were FC Cincinnati to make good on joining MLS for 2019, the rest of 2018 and winter 2019 would see the club go into hyperdrive in terms of preparing all aspects of the club for the heightened visibility, fan interest, tourism to Cincinnati, brand awareness, merchandising and on-field expectations that accompany being an MLS team.
The club would also continue preparations for using the University of Cincinnati's Nippert Stadium as a temporary venue while its West End stadium is under construction.
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