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Hello! Promotion and relegation could be heading to America’s soccer scene.
On the way:
⚔️ A rival league to MLS?
🧒 Teen’s record Euro night
👀 The Everton/porn star link
🟨 Foul on a linesman
League Of Their Own? USL to create top-flight men’s division to compete with MLS
The substantive difference between professional leagues in the United States and those in much of the rest of the world is America’s aversion to promotion and relegation. It’s not a soccer thing, but a U.S. thing, the culture of franchises across the NBA, the NFL and beyond.
In football/soccer specifically, though, that might be about to change. Top-flight competition as we know it in the U.S. boils down to Major League Soccer, a franchise system that expands as it sees fit (latest newcomers San Diego FC are days away from their inaugural MLS season). If you’re in, you’re in. If you’re not, there’s no results-based mechanism to force the door open.
MLS has faced prior challenges to its dominance. You might recall The Athletic’s recent legal report about the defunct North American Soccer League (NASL) failing to prove that MLS and U.S. Soccer had conspired to bring about its demise, a dispute that involved basketball star Carmelo Anthony.
Yesterday, though, we got wind of a fresh, concerted plan to tentatively rival MLS, drawn up by the United Soccer League (USL) and revealed by Paul Tenorio. USL sits beneath MLS in the American pyramid and ranks as a lesser cousin, but it has ambition to grow and it’s shown its hand.
A promotion-relegation sea change?
In its current form, USL has two leagues or conferences: division two and division three. Permission to run a division one — something MLS holds but NASL was never granted — depends on meeting strict criteria set by U.S. Soccer, all of which Paul outlines in his article.
USL now intends to create its own division one to operate separately to MLS. To my mind, it’s like the Premier League and the EFL ploughing their own furrows as top flights rather than being directly linked. USL president Paul McDonough makes a valid point: population-wise, the U.S. is vast, yet MLS gives it just 30 top-tier teams. Europe carries hundreds. The scope to grow must be there.
One of McDonough’s targets is for USL to become the first American sporting competition to adopt promotion and relegation, or ‘pro-rel’, a sea change in line with global football as a whole. It would be a change for USL, too, which has previously resisted the proposal.
It’s not to say this will come to fruition, or to pretend that USL and MLS are fundamentally identical. USL, for instance, has no salary cap and different rules around club ownership. It also has nothing like the same financial clout behind it. That said, seven existing MLS sides came there by way of USL.
But if somewhere down the line USL developed popular appeal and gave MLS a run for its money, would the competition be compelled to intertwine for the health of the sport? Would the jeopardy of promotion and relegation become part of the furniture? Or is the proposed structure too complicated or risky — not forgetting the absence of relegation protects MLS franchise valuations?
Paul’s piece drew a stack of comments, so I asked for his take: “The idea behind the USL first division is absolutely correct: more markets with top-tier professional soccer is better for the growth of the sport. The challenge will be in finding investors and building out infrastructure. It has to start with stadiums. As for pro-rel, I’m in ‘believe it when I see it’ mode.”
News round-up
- That Dutch game in which Fortuna Sittard had 12 players on the pitch for 20-odd seconds (above)? It won’t be replayed, even though Fortuna claimed a 2-2 draw with Heerenveen after the error was spotted.
- Confirmed by Arsenal: Kai Havertz is out for the season. His torn hamstring requires surgery.
- The epic delay in awarding Everton’s equaliser in the Merseyside derby might soon be a thing of the past. Semi-automated offside technology will finally be trialled in England next month. Arne Slot says he regrets losing his cool after the goal was given.
- Everton and Liverpool have jointly condemned racist abuse of Abdoulaye Doucoure that was posted on social media after their stormy tangle.
- Barcelona have tied Pau Cubarsi down, formally extending his contract to 2029. He’s worth it.
- Chelsea co-owner Todd Boehly is part of a £520m ($649.6m) investment in cricket franchise The Hundred.
- In the trial of former Spanish Football Federation president Luis Rubiales, his lawyer told the court that Spain striker Jenni Hermoso objecting to Rubiales kissing her in 2023 “does not mean she did not give consent” and does not “make it a crime”. Hermoso insists the kiss was not consensual.
Golden boy: Noonan, 16, creates history with debut goal
Grit your teeth for a fresh instalment of ‘how old do we all feel?’. History was made last night as Michael Noonan became the second-youngest goalscorer in European club competition — aged 16 years and 197 days.
I hear what you’re asking: who’s Michael Noonan? He’s an Irish striker, a Dubliner, who plays for League of Ireland side Shamrock Rovers. He’s a pup. Not only did his agile Conference League tap-in against Molde rank him just behind Nii Lamptey (who set the record in 1991 by scoring for Anderlecht in the old UEFA Cup aged 16 years and 100 days), it came on his club debut, too.
He’s so unfamiliar that I really can’t say if you need to remember the name but, hey, the archives will, and he won’t forget the date. Not that it stopped him having to check in for school this morning…
Elsewhere in Europe:
- Jose Mourinho is about to attack the latter stages of the Europa League again, a trophy he won at Manchester United. His Fenerbahce team are all but through after beating Anderlecht 3-0 in their play-off first leg.
- Turkish Super Lig leaders Galatasaray are hanging by a thread. They were hammered 4-1 by Dutch side AZ in one of two notable surprises.
- The other being Iceland’s Vikingur Reykjavik (forced to decamp to Helsinki in Finland because their own ground doesn’t satisfy UEFA) doing Panathinaikos over in the Conference League. The Greeks will surely turn a 2-1 deficit around.
Around The Athletic FC
(Getty Images; design: Eamonn Dalton)
Quiz question
I reckon there’s a solid chance of you nailing this week’s quiz. Put these clubs in order of the last time they were relegated from England’s top division, starting with the most recent: Arsenal, Chelsea, Everton, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United, Tottenham Hotspur.
We’ll have the answer here later today and in Monday’s TAFC.
Catch a match
(Selected games, times ET/UK)
Friday: Premier League: Brighton vs Chelsea, 3pm/8pm — USA Network, Fubo/Sky Sports.
Saturday: Premier League: Leicester City vs Arsenal, 7.30am/12.30pm — USA Network, Fubo/TNT Sports; Crystal Palace vs Everton, 12.30pm/5.30pm — NBC, Fubo, Peacock Premium/Sky Sports; La Liga: Osasuna vs Real Madrid, 10.15am/3.15pm — ESPN+, Fubo/Premier Sports; Bundesliga: Bayer Leverkusen vs Bayern Munich, 12.30pm/5.30pm — ESPN+/Sky Sports; Serie A: Lazio vs Napoli, 12pm/5pm — CBS, Paramount+, Fubo, Amazon Prime/OneFootball.
Sunday: Premier League: Liverpool vs Wolverhampton Wanderers, 9am/2pm — USA Network, Fubo/Sky Sports; Tottenham Hotspur vs Manchester United, 11.30am/4.30pm — Peacock Premium/Sky Sports; Serie A: Juventus vs Inter, 2.45pm/7.45pm — CBS, Paramount+, Amazon Prime/TNT Sports, OneFootball.
And finally…
Here’s Sunderland’s Luke O’Nien accidentally wiping out a linesman in a Championship game against Luton Town on Wednesday — and retaining the presence of mind to flag for a foul. The highlight of the audio from this tweet? The entire crowd laughing in unison.
(Top photo: Eakin Howard/USSF/Getty Images)
