Miami (AFP) – The United Soccer Leagues says it plans to become the first professional sports league in the USA to adopt promotion and relegation. USL, which operates outside of the structures of Major League Soccer, currently organizes a national second tier sanctioned league — the USL Championship and the third-tier League One.
But last month, the league announced plans to create a new top-tier division which, should it be sanctioned by the U.S Soccer Federation, would operate separate from MLS. At a meeting on Tuesday, USL clubs voted to introduce promotion and relegation as part of that plan to create a new division.
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USL president Paul McDonough told AFP on Wednesday the league believed the move would prove to be a popular one. “When we did the research a few years ago, we looked at the different things that could differentiate us and bring more relevance and launching a Division One and having promotion and relegation were two of them,” he said. “We just felt that if we are going to be relevant to the market and unique, launching a Division One and promotion and relegation makes us different,” he added.
MLS, which does not have a second division, operates in a similar way to the NFL and NBA with Eastern and Western conferences, playoffs to decide the champions, and no relegation for the bottom clubs. USL and MLS clubs only face each other in the annual US Open Cup knockout tournament. The USA is also unusual in having leagues at various levels run by different organizations, with the U.S Soccer Federation sanctioning the leagues based on a set of criteria.
McDonough said the USL had not discussed the changes with MLS and that the initiatives were entirely a USL project. The plan is, however, contingent on the creation of the new top-tier division which, as things stand, requires at least 12 clubs that must have stadiums with a capacity of at least 15,000. That would necessitate venue expansion from most of the clubs in USL, although McDonough said he hopes some entirely new clubs will be created for the top division.
McDonough suggested that promotion and relegation’s potential would not be fully realized and it would not be “authentic” if it were introduced into the current system, stressing that successfully creating a new division was vital to making the plan work. “We need to have three tiers for it to be really successful,” he said.
USL is hoping to have their new division up and running in 2028 and to introduce promotion and relegation with that change.
© 2024 AFP
