Latest news with #AmericanSoccer
Yahoo
9 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Empty seats are everywhere at the Club World Cup. But does this miss the real point?
If there's a lesson to be learned from the Club World Cup so far, it's that images of nothingness can still generate hysteria. Empty seats – which are apparently a festering scourge upon the game of football, a tragedy representing the plastic bankruptcy of American soccer fandom and/or the Club World Cup, an issue demanding alarmist coverage delivered with brows fully furrowed – have been commonplace in the competition's opening dozen games. Headlines (including from this very publication) have followed. Social media is awash in panoramic photos from a nation of press boxes, informing you incredulously that this image, so obscene in its emptiness, was taken a mere 45 minutes before kickoff – or (gasp) even closer. Why do we, the fans, observers, journalists, and other people who simply watch these games, care? What is it about the sight of a whole lot of plastic folding chairs with nobody in them that inflames our passions? Since when did we all become Clint Eastwood at the 2012 Republican National Convention? Advertisement Related: Trent Alexander-Arnold takes first step of Real Madrid high-wire act | Barney Ronay Empty seats mean unrealized revenues from tickets, concessions, merchandise, parking and exploitative fees, but that stuff isn't affecting our bottom line. The marketing strategy that demanded premium prices for those seats was misguided at best and laughably hubristic at worst, but it was not ours. There were plenty of inflated promises about guaranteed sellouts, the 'greatest spectacle in club football history', involving the '32 best teams in the world' that are being made to look completely silly in hindsight – but we weren't the ones who promised them. At most, the extent of our involvement with an empty seat at the Club World Cup is sitting next to one. Still, the tenor of the zeitgeist contains a strange mix of worry, sadness, and above all, cynicism. The empty seats are taken as a physical sign that while Fifa may care a little about games taking place in front of passionate fans, it cares far more about the money it gets from selling the TV rights, advertising space, and other considerations – often to the sovereign wealth fund of the country hosting a future World Cup, or the previous one. In theory, the empty seats prove that fans and atmosphere – the things that make soccer what it is – are of secondary importance. I would suggest that these critiques, while valid and true, miss the point. We are just talking about seats here. Not all of them are empty, and many of them are in very, very large stadiums. So far, Club World Cup venues have been about 52% full on average, using attendance figures as announced by Fifa. (In reality, those figures are likely far more representative of the number of tickets sold or distributed rather than butts in seats, but they at least give us an idea.) Going by the median percentage, which downplays the outliers, stadiums have been at 43% capacity. Advertisement Those are ugly numbers. If a professional club team (or several) consistently played in front of stadiums that were half-full or less, one might question whether they're playing in the right stadiums. If this dynamic sounds vaguely familiar to you, you may be a fan of MLS. The US first division began its life by living a week-in, week-out version of this very problem – a new competition that nobody knew quite what to make of, with most teams playing in massive NFL or college football stadiums in which even decent crowds were made to look minuscule and sparse. The league slowly but surely learned its lesson – nearly every one of its 30 teams plays in their own intimate grounds, the largest of which top out at about 30,000. It's not a league of constant sellouts, but the environments have improved markedly. It's a lesson Fifa should have learned, given they're hosting this tournament in MLS's backyard. There were plenty of raucous Brazilian fans on hand at the cavernous MetLife Stadium on Tuesday for Fluminense's draw with Dortmund, but the 84,000 capacity venue was still half-full. It leaves you to wonder how much more intense the occasion might have been just down the road at the 25,000-capacity Sports Illustrated Stadium, home of the New York Red Bulls (which is also more easily-accessible by public transit). Myriad other factors have affected turnout. There are well-founded fears of Ice raids, which may well have kept immigrant fans – undocumented or not – away from stadiums. For traveling fans, visa processing times have been a nightmare. In the case of teams like Ulsan Hyundai, Urawa Red Diamonds and Mamelodi Sundowns, the competition is far enough away to make travel all but impossible. For domestic fans, many games take place in the middle of workdays. And that's without even getting into ticket prices, which started in the hundreds of dollars and have only dropped as the dynamic pricing model has kicked in with kickoffs looming. Related: David Squires on … gimmicks and surprise guests as the Club World Cup kicks off Seen one way, the 22,137 who attended Chelsea v LAFC in Atlanta left 70% of the stadium empty. Seen another way, thousands of Atlantans (as well as Chelsea and LAFC fans) showed up despite all the mitigating factors listed above, in the middle of a Monday work day, for a game in a competition that nobody seems to know what to make of, involving an MLS team that plays 3,000 miles away and who only officially qualified weeks ago. I submit to you that, given all that, the attendance was a minor triumph. Chelsea will play in front of fewer fans when they visit Bournemouth's Dean Court this upcoming Premier League season. Advertisement Similarly, perhaps it should be celebrated that just under 35,000 came to see Flamengo play Esperance de Tunis later that night in Philadelphia, or that 40,311 dealt with the well-known traffic and crowd issues at the Rose Bowl to watch Monterrey v Inter. These are not the sellouts Fifa promised, but those promises, like many Fifa boasts, were stupid. The enthusiasm evident in the crowds themselves tell the rest of the story. When crowd sizes rankle, perhaps the problem is one of perception; of Fifa's uncanny ability to get in its own way. Football's world governing body has allowed the luxurious excesses of the World Cup – as in the actual one, the one that will take place next year – to cloud its vision of what this tournament, what the club game, is and can be. The World Cup has prestige. So much prestige, in fact, that fans can be assured that no matter which teams they're going to see, they will be watching a seminal moment in the modern history of those countries' sporting stories; and perhaps a milestone in the life of a country itself. Being a club fan is far more intimate, even for the biggest clubs in the world. It's a regular, everyday devotion that simply doesn't fit with Fifa's maximalist tendencies. Maybe that's why empty seats at these games have become such a focal point – they're an uncomfortable reminder that the world of every club is only so big.
The Guardian
10 hours ago
- Sport
- The Guardian
Empty seats are everywhere at the Club World Cup. But does this miss the real point?
If there's a lesson to be learned from the Club World Cup so far, it's that images of nothingness can still generate hysteria. Empty seats – which are apparently a festering scourge upon the game of football, a tragedy representing the plastic bankruptcy of American soccer fandom and/or the Club World Cup, an issue demanding alarmist coverage delivered with brows fully furrowed – have been commonplace in the competition's opening dozen games. Headlines (including from this very publication) have followed. Social media is awash in panoramic photos from a nation of press boxes, informing you incredulously that this image, so obscene in its emptiness, was taken a mere 45 minutes before kickoff – or (gasp) even closer. Why do we, the fans, observers, journalists, and other people who simply watch these games, care? What is it about the sight of a whole lot of plastic folding chairs with nobody in them that inflames our passions? Since when did we all become Clint Eastwood at the 2012 Republican National Convention? Empty seats mean unrealized revenues from tickets, concessions, merchandise, parking and exploitative fees, but that stuff isn't affecting our bottom line. The marketing strategy that demanded premium prices for those seats was misguided at best and laughably hubristic at worst, but it was not ours. There were plenty of inflated promises about guaranteed sellouts, the 'greatest spectacle in club football history', involving the '32 best teams in the world' that are being made to look completely silly in hindsight – but we weren't the ones who promised them. At most, the extent of our involvement with an empty seat at the Club World Cup is sitting next to one. Still, the tenor of the zeitgeist contains a strange mix of worry, sadness, and above all, cynicism. The empty seats are taken as a physical sign that while Fifa may care a little about games taking place in front of passionate fans, it cares far more about the money it gets from selling the TV rights, advertising space, and other considerations – often to the sovereign wealth fund of the country hosting a future World Cup, or the previous one. In theory, the empty seats prove that fans and atmosphere – the things that make soccer what it is – are of secondary importance. I would suggest that these critiques, while valid and true, miss the point. We are just talking about seats here. Not all of them are empty, and many of them are in very, very large stadiums. So far, Club World Cup venues have been about 52% full on average, using attendance figures as announced by Fifa. (In reality, those figures are likely far more representative of the number of tickets sold or distributed rather than butts in seats, but they at least give us an idea.) Going by the median percentage, which downplays the outliers, stadiums have been at 43% capacity. Those are ugly numbers. If a professional club team (or several) consistently played in front of stadiums that were half-full or less, one might question whether they're playing in the right stadiums. If this dynamic sounds vaguely familiar to you, you may be a fan of MLS. The US first division began its life by living a week-in, week-out version of this very problem – a new competition that nobody knew quite what to make of, with most teams playing in massive NFL or college football stadiums in which even decent crowds were made to look minuscule and sparse. The league slowly but surely learned its lesson – nearly every one of its 30 teams plays in their own intimate grounds, the largest of which top out at about 30,000. It's not a league of constant sellouts, but the environments have improved markedly. It's a lesson Fifa should have learned, given they're hosting this tournament in MLS's backyard. There were plenty of raucous Brazilian fans on hand at the cavernous MetLife Stadium on Tuesday for Fluminense's draw with Dortmund, but the 84,000 capacity venue was still half-full. It leaves you to wonder how much more intense the occasion might have been just down the road at the 25,000-capacity Sports Illustrated Stadium, home of the New York Red Bulls (which is also more easily-accessible by public transit). Myriad other factors have affected turnout. There are well-founded fears of Ice raids, which may well have kept immigrant fans – undocumented or not – away from stadiums. For traveling fans, visa processing times have been a nightmare. In the case of teams like Ulsan Hyundai, Urawa Red Diamonds and Mamelodi Sundowns, the competition is far enough away to make travel all but impossible. For domestic fans, many games take place in the middle of workdays. And that's without even getting into ticket prices, which started in the hundreds of dollars and have only dropped as the dynamic pricing model has kicked in with kickoffs looming. Sign up to Soccer with Jonathan Wilson Jonathan Wilson brings expert analysis on the biggest stories from European soccer after newsletter promotion Seen one way, the 22,137 who attended Chelsea v LAFC in Atlanta left 70% of the stadium empty. Seen another way, thousands of Atlantans (as well as Chelsea and LAFC fans) showed up despite all the mitigating factors listed above, in the middle of a Monday work day, for a game in a competition that nobody seems to know what to make of, involving an MLS team that plays 3,000 miles away and who only officially qualified weeks ago. I submit to you that, given all that, the attendance was a minor triumph. Chelsea will play in front of fewer fans when they visit Bournemouth's Dean Court this upcoming Premier League season. Similarly, perhaps it should be celebrated that just under 35,000 came to see Flamengo play Esperance de Tunis later that night in Philadelphia, or that 40,311 dealt with the well-known traffic and crowd issues at the Rose Bowl to watch Monterrey v Inter. These are not the sellouts Fifa promised, but those promises, like many Fifa boasts, were stupid. The enthusiasm evident in the crowds themselves tell the rest of the story. When crowd sizes rankle, perhaps the problem is one of perception; of Fifa's uncanny ability to get in its own way. Football's world governing body has allowed the luxurious excesses of the World Cup – as in the actual one, the one that will take place next year – to cloud its vision of what this tournament, what the club game, is and can be. The World Cup has prestige. So much prestige, in fact, that fans can be assured that no matter which teams they're going to see, they will be watching a seminal moment in the modern history of those countries' sporting stories; and perhaps a milestone in the life of a country itself. Being a club fan is far more intimate, even for the biggest clubs in the world. It's a regular, everyday devotion that simply doesn't fit with Fifa's maximalist tendencies. Maybe that's why empty seats at these games have become such a focal point – they're an uncomfortable reminder that the world of every club is only so big.
Forbes
07-05-2025
- Sport
- Forbes
Lauren Holiday: Champion Beyond The Field
L auren Holiday stands as one of the most accomplished and resilient figures in American soccer whose impact extends far beyond her remarkable achievements on the pitch. As a two-time Olympic gold medalist and FIFA Women's World Cup champion with the U.S. Women's National Team, Holiday established herself as an elite midfielder known for her extraordinary vision, technical skill and selfless play that elevated everyone around her. What truly distinguishes Holiday is her grace under pressure, both in sports and life. After retiring at the peak of her career in 2015 to start a family, she faced a life-threatening health crisis when she was diagnosed with a brain tumor while pregnant with her first child. Her subsequent recovery and advocacy work, alongside her NBA champion husband Jrue Holiday, has inspired countless people through their social justice initiatives and the JLH Fund, which supports Black-owned businesses and nonprofits. Holiday's journey from soccer prodigy to champion, mother, survivor and changemaker exemplifies how athletic excellence can be a foundation for even greater impact beyond the game. Holiday's path to becoming one of soccer's elite players was never straightforward. Her journey demanded a resilience that would later define her approach to off- and on-field challenges. It started with the highly competitive youth soccer landscape which included injuries and setbacks before and after joining the national team. "There is so much beauty in the trenches," Holiday reflects, looking back on her career. This perspective—finding purpose in difficulty—became her hallmark, particularly evident during the 2015 World Cup when, despite knowing it would be her final tournament, she sublimated personal glory to take on a more defensive role that the team needed. Her persistence reached its most profound test in 2016 when, six months pregnant with her daughter, doctors discovered a benign brain tumor. The timing couldn't have been more challenging, requiring her to delay critical surgery until after giving birth. Through this harrowing period, Holiday applied the same methodical determination that characterized her playing career. "I'd tell my younger self to trust that staying rooted in her values will take her further than chasing validation ever could," Holiday says. "There will be pressure to fit a mold, to measure success by trophies or headlines, but real success is being able to look in the mirror and know you led with integrity." This philosophy guided her through recovery and into her post-playing career, where grit has taken new forms—building businesses, foundations and advocating for causes with the same steady commitment she once brought to the training ground. PURPOSE Holiday's strategic mindset extends far beyond her tactical brilliance on the soccer field. Throughout her career, she approached every challenge with a thoughtful intentionality that balanced immediate goals with long-term vision. This calculated approach became evident in her decision to retire at 27—walking away at her peak to prioritize family and explore broader impact opportunities. With her husband Jrue, Lauren has developed a distinctive approach to business and philanthropy that reflects their shared values. "We approach everything—investments, philanthropy, business—with the mindset that it has to serve a greater purpose," Holiday explains. "We don't want to be transactional. We want to be transformational. We ask: Does it align with our faith, our family mission and our commitment to justice?" This strategic framework led to the creation of the JLH Fund in 2020, which provided over $5 million in grants to Black-owned businesses and nonprofits during the pandemic. Rather than haphazard giving, the Holidays prioritized deep impact through targeted investments in underserved communities. This integrated approach to decision-making has allowed Holiday to build ventures that align with her personal mission while maintaining balance. She strategically leverages her platform not just for personal gain, but to create opportunities for others, particularly women athletes navigating their own career transitions. PASSION What separates Holiday from many elite athletes is how she has channeled her passions beyond sport into every aspect of her life and career. Her faith, commitment to social justice and desire to empower women have been consistent threads throughout her journey, giving deeper meaning to her athletic achievements and guiding her post-playing endeavors. "My passions outside of soccer—whether it's my faith, social justice or empowering women—have always given deeper meaning to why I played," Holiday shares. "They've made me a better teammate and leader, because I saw the game as part of something bigger. Those same passions are now driving me to build platforms that support athletes, not just as performers, but as people with dreams." This holistic view enabled Holiday to maintain perspective during her playing days, preventing the common trap of having one's identity completely consumed by athletic performance. It also prepared her for a smooth transition when she stepped away from competition—she already had well-developed interests and purpose beyond soccer. Her passion for player development and mentorship has found expression through coaching clinics and speaking engagements where she encourages young athletes to cultivate their whole selves. "You are more than your sport and the sooner you embrace that, the more powerful your platform becomes," she advises. "Don't wait for retirement to start building your voice, your brand, your impact. Let what lights you up guide you, whether it's fashion, finance, education or activism." Through her foundation work, business ventures and advocacy, Holiday consistently demonstrates how athletic excellence can serve as a launchpad for deeper passions. "Soccer gave me a stage," she reflects. "Now I'm using it to spotlight others." Explore The Series And Meet More Mould-Breaking Creators CREDIT Photographer: Mary Kouw/CBS via Getty Images
