World Cup Soccer In The SEC?
April 15th, 2009 ║ Posted By: John Pennington ║ Permalink ║ Tags: Alabama, Arkansas, Auburn, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, LSU, Mississippi State, Ole Miss, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vanderbilt
First of all, I like soccer. Okay? There. I said it.
In fact, I got to watch a little bit of Liverpool take it on the chin versus Chelsea in the Champions League yesterday. Why in the heck did…
Nevermind.
As you might have heard, the United States is prepping a possible bid for the 2018 or 2022 World Cup. The US hosted the event in 1994 and, having attended a match in Dallas, I can say that it was a blast.
The US group that’s thinking about making the bid is currently looking at 70 different venues as possible host sites for World Cup games.
Nine of them are SEC football stadiums.
They are:
Sanford Stadium in Athens
Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge
Bryant-Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa
Williams-Brice Stadium in Columbia
Jordan-Hare Stadium in Auburn
Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville
Ben Hill Griffin Stadium in Gainesville
Neyland Stadium in Knoxville
Commonwealth Stadium in Lexington
For those keeping track, when FIFA came to the US in ‘94, the host sites were: the Rose Bowl, the Pontiac Silverdome, Stanford Stadium, Giants Stadium, the Florida Citrus Bowl, Soldier Field, the Cotton Bowl, Foxboro Stadium and RFK Stadium.
In other words, I wouldn’t anticipate many Italians waving flags in the streets of Fayetteville, Arkansas just yet.
Ditto Saudis in Auburn or Czechs in Baton Rouge.
The odds of the World Cup coming to the US… and then Cup games being awarded to small SEC markets… are probably slim at best.
