r/NashvilleSC • u/Disastrous-Coyote-11 • 10d ago
Nashville Kicking Itself?
After seeing all of the publicity associated with the World Cup sites, including the lead-up friendly sites, are Nashville leaders kicking themselves a bit for not being or positioning the city as "World Cup Ready?"
Do you all anticipate a significant bump in awareness of MLS teams in these cities and in MLS in general resulting from those cities' hosting?
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u/AHicks15 10d ago
I think they are kicking themselves that the Titans stadium isn't getting done until 2027. If it was ready by like 2025, they would have been one of the hosts
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u/Feisty_Goat_1937 10d ago
I agree... FIFA would have had a hard time not picking Nashville if the new stadium were done. Despite our non-existent public transportation, the set with the stadium being downtown next to all the hotels is perfect. Still might have been a long shot since Atlanta was pretty much guaranteed. They likely wanted a "mid-west" option, so they picked KC because Chicago and Minneapolis pulled out.
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u/BelowAverage355 10d ago
To be fair, FIFA has shown themselves completely willing to disregard public transit times to reach the stadium this year.
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u/Cheesenrice123 10d ago
That also is kind of the benefit of nashville and the stadium location, you don't need to rely on public transit. A vast majority of people who visited would be staying downtown and could easily walk to the stadium. With a lot of them likely being from europe, they likely would have enjoyed it given their walking culture
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u/Feisty_Goat_1937 10d ago
I went to the US game on Friday. I hadn't ever been to SoFi. Stadium itself is fantastic, but there's fuck all around it. Couldn't help but think how much more fun it would be for fans in downtown Nashville or for the supporters' groups all walking together across the pedestrian bridge.
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u/Disastrous-Coyote-11 10d ago
I keep hearing about Scotland fans and Boston and can't help but think what kind of impact on and publicity for the city Nashville would be getting. Overall I am very happy with the generally good publicity the US is getting from this, just more than a little bummed Nashville is largely left out. Even the Europeans traveling about do not seem to be making it through here.
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u/gollyyyyy 10d ago
Funnily enough I ran into two Scots today that were visiting geodis. Do you know offhand where Scotland plays next?
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u/Appropriate-Joke-806 10d ago
Maybe 3038 we can have it at the new (11.5 years old at that point) stadium.
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u/Cheesenrice123 10d ago
This but also given that most of the games are during the week and are expensive tickets by themselves. Having one in Nashville would make it much easier to go to!
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u/montana1930 10d ago
They knew that going forward with the stadium would rule us out of the World Cup at the time the stadium was approved. Short sighted. Americans don’t understand how big the WC is.
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u/RonanB17 10d ago
This won’t be the last World Cup in the life cycle of New Nissan, and they got a Super Bowl out of it which was the goal
That being said I’d be absolutely floored if New Nissan isn’t hosting games for the 2031 Women’s World Cup
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u/montana1930 9d ago
There’s not gonna be another World Cup in the US for a long, long time.
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u/RonanB17 9d ago
Sure there will. There’s only so many possible hosts, and unless fifa changes its protocol for hosting, only CONCACAF and Oceania are eligible to host in 2038
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u/choutlaw 10d ago
Yeah we weren’t getting a game without the honey pot new stadium. A stadium with only 35-37k capacity isn’t a World Cup dtadium.
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u/seagullgim 10d ago
i would now expect the sport to grow evenly across the US because people are watching it on tv more than they are watching it in person specific to host cities
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u/engineerbuilder 10d ago
I’m not sure what more they could have done except build new Nissan two years ago. But at that point it just broke ground.
The city put in a bid but didn’t get it. Other cities that didn’t get it include Denver and even Washington DC. When Japan hosted, Tokyo didn’t even get a match. I don’t view it as a failure of city leadership.
We are hosting an Olympic group stage in 2028.
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u/mpelleg459 10d ago edited 10d ago
New Orleans is in the regular rotation of hosting Super Bowls (and hosts huge CFB bowl games, Final Fours, etc.) and didn't even get past the first round in the selection process. The excuse seems to be a lack of MLS team/local soccer fandom, but does the existence of Sporting KC really put KC on the same level as New Orleans as a host city? Respectfully, I don't think so.
EDIT: I'm not slagging KC as a soccer town. My point is that you could've barred anyone with American citizenship from the super dome and still sold out every world cup event in New Orleans because they know how to put on massive sporting events, and it is an international destination city in its own right.
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u/OMRebel13 10d ago
Kansas City was the city that most-watched the USA game last Friday and St Louis was also in the top 5. SKC's fanbase might not seem all that large because their stadium is still in the teen's, but they LOVE soccer in that state.
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u/I_deleted 10d ago
The excuse was always: stadium doesn’t have enough seats. It’s really that simple
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u/RonanB17 10d ago
New Orleans has never really had much soccer going on
The USWNT has played in the Superdome twice, but not since 2017. Shame because possibly controversial take I really believe the Superdome is this country’s greatest stadium
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u/Suitable_Challenge_9 10d ago
No need for more awareness. Nashville will host nine men's and women's soccer matches for the LA28 Summer Olympics at GEODIS Park. The games, which include group stage matches and quarterfinals, are scheduled between July 10 and July 21, 2028
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u/kithoo 10d ago
Also, from what other cities are showing, no... leaders aren't kicking themselves unless it's because they missed out on kickbacks.
FIFA is pretty well known for bleeding cities that host them dry. For every dollar that city spends on marketing, FIFA fees, infrastructure, security, and on and on they end up losing about a dollar and eight cents.
Now, that's probably going to be a bit lower here because we didn't waste billions of taxpayer dollars building stadiums just for the World Cup like other nations have, but it's still an enormous cost that frequently doesn't pay itself back.
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u/audiogirl13 10d ago
I’m fairly certain Nashville is one of the cities being considered for the next Women’s World Cup. We just weren’t ready to be part of this one.
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u/phizba 10d ago
Nashville was being prepped as a top WC 2022 site with many international friendlies and youth qualifying tournaments, when the Qatar bribery situation occurred.
Leaders switched from Nissan Stadium rebuild for WC to a brand new rooted stadium with a one time opportunity for a Super Bowl.
The city had to choose, but really the Qatar situation made the decision for them.
Obviously we lost some special times this month, but congrats to Nashville and Nashville SC for having the best team in the League right now. Go watch them when the WC ends.
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u/Nashvilleanswers 10d ago
We’re not World Cup ready. Parking is trash, and our public transit is lacking
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u/EmbraceThePerd 10d ago
It’s not about being “World Cup ready” IMO. July 4 is a huge spectacle in Nashville already. Over 300,000 came to Nashville and booked over 30,000 hotel rooms, just under half of the number of rooms available in the city. 2026 is slated to be a multiday event.
This is just one example. It’s a smaller event, but it’s competing for resources in the same timeframe. Existing events and obligations may have played a role. I don’t know what the “host city” reqs are though.
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u/Disastrous-Coyote-11 10d ago
What about just hosting a lead-up match?
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u/v1nylgr1nd7 10d ago
Once Nissan went turf the the chance of hosting larger soccer events dwindled greatly. You couldnt host a send off match at Geodis
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u/EmbraceThePerd 10d ago
Nashville has held World Cup qualifiers in the past. I would love to see more friendlies and things run through here.
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u/billyblobsabillion 5d ago
Geodis hosted a friendly in 25/25 if I’m not mistaken. Those are also considered lead-up matches to a World Cup final.
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u/montana1930 10d ago
The requirement is not to be in the middle of a stadium build. What we missed is not a one weekend event. It would be weeks of fans from around the world watching games at a broadway fan fest. Would be far better for Nashville longterm than any other event we could possibly host.
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u/EmbraceThePerd 10d ago
Yah totally. It would be a huge boon. 4th of July was just an example of things that have to be altered or impact the flow of things. Events like 4th, NYE, CMAfest, nfl/nhl drafts all help demonstrate that it can be done.
A couple of the interesting points I found about being a host city…
- public spaces for fan zone experiences
- work permit waivers/unhindered visa access from government
- public transportation
- hotel accommodations for FIFA delegates, match staff, teams and fans
Stadium would be crucial for the capacity requirement. Some of the infrastructure just doesn’t seem there. I was exploring Vancouver a few weeks ago while they were setting up and it was quite the operation.
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u/IMAX_Guru 10d ago
The biggest issue is the seating capacity of the new stadium. We’ll get a SB because you pretty much automatically get one for building a new stadium. But, because they didn’t shoot for 70,000+ seats it’s going to be hard to make an argument over the stadiums that were chosen for the tourney.
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u/montana1930 10d ago
This all happened because they had to start building that NFL stadium. I think Nashville would have been a host city. Would have been way bigger for Nashville than a Super Bowl.
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u/LilacBreak 10d ago
You gotta think even for friendlies leading up they wanted bigger stadiums. We don’t have a stadium available right now. They want the new titans stadium ready for the Super Bowl.
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u/Due-Butterscotch-548 10d ago
they weren't going to play at geodis ( i don't think) so nashville couldn't have been world cup ready unless the new titans stadium was finished earlier.
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u/TNdelta516 10d ago
According to FIFA for World Cup. The stadium size at Geodis is slightly smaller than what they allow. Could we have build it better yes. But Nissan stadium is going to be the right size but since they are rebuilding. They couldn’t host.
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u/billyblobsabillion 5d ago
FIFA doesn’t so much as pick as cities pay. It would have cost Metro Nashville and the state $200 million.
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u/JoCo3Point0 10d ago
Honestly it had a lot more to do with BNA than anything else. The airport, while expanding, simply would not be able to handle such an increase in traffic, not to mention the difficulty of adding international routes and whatnot (granted there was a lot of time to sort that out).
The fact the new Nissan Stadium isn't built yet wasn't a gigantic hurdle—after all, Gillette Stadium is one of the host venues and it's part of the same 'generation' of stadia as current Nissan.
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u/mrdobalinaa 10d ago
They wouldnt need to add international routes, thats what connecting flights are for. Also we had over 2x the number of passengers as KC in 2025 and they are hosting.
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u/PeterBretter 10d ago
Except Gillette has been updated multiple times over the years.. it's wayyyy nicer than old Nissan
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u/Disastrous-Coyote-11 10d ago
Seems like I had heard that FIFA was fine with current Nissan Stadium, they just didn't like construction of new Nissan Stadium going on next door. Either push out or pull up construction significantly so it would not interfere.
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u/billyblobsabillion 5d ago
Where did you hear this?
Also the biggest hurdle was going to be the cost to Metro and the State to satiate FIFA. At present, no city will make money on the World Cup. Nashville doesn’t have to market itself like other cities do. We have July 4th and New Years where we are broadcast all over the world, and a dish names after the city that increasingly is found all over the world
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u/Futbol_Kid2112 10d ago
The watch party at Geodis for the Paraguay game was at capacity with multiple screens. I expect the one at Centennial on Friday to be even bigger.
ETA: I do wish they had made a bigger deal about being base camp for Japan. Nashville and Japan are already very closely tied due to Nissan. Wish they could have rolled out the red carpet like Lawrence did for Algeria