Is the World Cup bump real? MLS is going to find out

MLS stakeholders want to turn the interest in this summer’s North American World Cup into ‘rocket fuel’ for the league. Are those realistic expectations? In 1998, a full eight years before Major League Soccer debuted, it got its first “World Cup bump”. Fifa had just awarded the 1994 World Cup to the United States, but there was a stipulation. The US could host the tournament, but only if there was a competitive club league in place by the time it rolled around, something that hadn’t been true since the North American Soccer League collapsed in 1985. Tournament organisers missed that 1994 deadline, but two years later, MLS became a reality. Thirty years on, it is still here. Continue reading...

By Pablo Iglesias Maurer