Nashville granted MLS expansion team

NASHVILLE, TENN. » Major League Commissioner Don Garber says Nashville has been granted the first of two expansion franchises.

Garber made the announcement Wednesday at a news conference with Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam, Nashville Mayor Megan Barry and John R. Ingram, head of the group now bringing an MLS team to Nashville.

Nashville and Sacramento, California, had been viewed as the favorites for the league’s newest teams, with Cincinnati and Detroit the other finalists. A decision on the second area picked is expected within a few weeks. Atlanta United and Minnesota United came on board this year as MLS’ latest expansion teams.

Nashville’s group includes Ingram, the chairman of Ingram Industries Inc., and the Wilf family, owner of the NFL’s Minnesota Vikings.

The Metro Nashville City Council on Nov. 7 approved $225 million in revenue bonds to construct a 27,500-seat soccer stadium and an additional $50 million in bonds for renovations and improvements around the site at the current fairgrounds.

Atlanta United and Minnesota United were the two expansion teams that came on board this year

This announcement brings another league into Tennessee. Nashville has an NFL franchise in the Tennessee Titans, which arrived from Houston in 1997. The Predators began play in 1998 as an NHL expansion franchise and lost to Pittsburgh in this year’s Stanley Cup Final.

Music City has been hosting soccer at the Titans’ Nissan Stadium in recent years and impressed Garber this summer when the U.S. played Panama in its CONCACAF Gold Cup opener. The July 8 game drew 42,622 fans to Nissan Stadium, and 56,232 attended a preseason exhibition on July 29 between Manchester City and Tottenham. A U.S. women’s national team match against France in March 2016 was attended by 25,363.

“If you don’t have success with friendlies or international competition, you’re not going to have success in MLS,” Garber has said. “So that’s a checked box that we’ve actually checked a while ago.”

Nashville’s stadium proposal also includes private development of 10 acres around the stadium and renovation of the fairgrounds. The stadium could open by March 2021 with bonds approved on the condition Nashville receive an expansion franchise from MLS.

Chancellor Ellen Hobbs Lyle on Monday dismissed a lawsuit filed in Tennessee Chancery Court’s 20th Judicial District by a group called Save Our Fairgrounds and 11 individuals. They were attempting to obtain court orders blocking a stadium to preserve the site for the state fair, auto racing and regular flea markets.

LaPointe dropped, leaving 8 running for US Soccer president CHICAGO » Paul LaPointe has been eliminated from contention in the election to succeed Sunil Gulati as U.S. Soccer Federation president, leaving eight candidates for the Feb. 10 vote.

The USSF released the list of candidates on Wednesday, eight days after nominations were due. Each candidate was required to have three nominations from members of the organization or athlete members of the board of directors.

Former men’s national team players Paul Caligiuri, Eric Wynalda and Kyle Martino are running, along with U.S. women’s goalkeeper Hope Solo; Soccer United Marketing president Kathy Carter; USSF vice president Carlos Cordeiro; Boston lawyer Steve Gans; and New York lawyer Michael Winograd.