Pope relishes challenge of building N.carolina club

MIAMI: On Sunday morning, 500 fans of a third division club that has never played a competitive game will board a bus in High Point, North Carolina, to travel to see their team’s debut.

It’s a 90-minute journey down to the suburbs of Charlote, the kind of trip which football fans in Europe and South America are well accustomed to making for games but until recently has been rare in most of the United States.

Carolina Core is the latest club to be formed in a further sign that the game is growing, not only in big markets such as Miami and Los Angeles, but in small town America, particularly in the South.

For Eddie Pope, who played in three World Cups for the USA and is now the Core’s chief soccer officer, the cultural shit in the country has been noticeable.

“The game is on television all the time. There are stadiums where you can go to watch the game. Kids are now walking around in (team) jerseys, they understand the sport. There are more fans. It has just grown,” he told AFP in an interview.

The Core hope to develop local players as well as the recruits they have brought in from Europe and South America, but also aim to be part of the thriving soccer culture.

“It’s also about giving this community more entertainment from a football standpoint, a team of their own to watch and support,” said Pope who played in the 1998, 2002 and 2006 World Cups.

The Core is a hometown team for Pope, born in High Point, a town of 114,000 located in the Piedmont Triad region of North Carolina -- a state very much at the heart of the ‘soccer boom.’

MLS club Charlote FC averages more than 30,000 for home games and drew a crowd of 62,291 fans for a home opener last month.

The Core will take a bow in MLS Next Pro, a third-tier league featuring affiliate and reserve teams of MLS clubs along with new independent teams like the Core.

Sunday’s opponents, Crown Legacy, are Charlote’s reserves but North and South Carolina are home to a number of other professional clubs.

Charleston Batery, Charlote Independence, Greenville Triumph and Raleigh-based North Carolina FC play in the United Soccer Leagues lower division structure.

Atendances for such clubs are far from MLS levels but the Core are spending significant money on facilities, in contrast to the years when clubs had to play on high school American football fields.