By Paul Nicholson
January 10 – Tomorrow the National Soccer Coaches Association of America (NSCAA) opens their annual conference in Los Angeles, the largest soccer convention in the world and the largest coaching convention of any sport worldwide. More than 20,000 participants are expected to attend, an increasing number of them international visitors.
January 10 – Just a few days after being granted Division II status in the US, the United Soccer League (USL) announced how its 30 teams will divide into Eastern and Western conferences for the 2017 expanded 32-game schedule.
By Paul Nicholson
January 9 – The perilous but tenacious state of the North American Soccer League (NASL) and the upstart and growing status of the United Soccer League (USL) have both been recognised by US Soccer (USSF) which has granted one-year provisional Division II status to both leagues for the 2017 season.
January 5 – The National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) has released a list of 148 college players for its 2017 NWSL College Draft which will take place at the same time as the National Soccer Coaches Association of America (NSCAA) Convention in Los Angeles on January 12.
December 28 – The warm-up for the Beach Soccer World Cup in the Bahamas in 2017 starts with the 2017 CONCACAF Beach Soccer Championship February 20-26 which will qualify two teams for the World Cup.
December 23 – FC Barcelona, part of a multi-pronged Spanish football assault force on the commercial opportunities provided by the US market, have said they are looking to set up a professional women’s team in the country and are in discussion with the US Soccer Federation (USSF) to do so.
By Paul Nicholson
December 20 – The Gold Cup 2017, CONCACAF’s top event for national teams, will be played in a total of 14 stadiums in 13 metropolitan areas, four of them first-time hosts, as the confederation expands the competition to support emerging football markets in the US.
December 16 – Fan voting has opened for the CONCACAF annual awards, the fourth time the awards have been held.
December 16 – The MLS ended its 2016 season with a series of record numbers from attendance to bigger and better TV deals. A stark contrast to the second tier NASL that is struggling for survival.
By Samindra Kunti and Paul Nicholson
December 15 – The news that New York Cosmos owner Seamus O’Brien has cut playing and coaching staff and trimmed operational overhead at the club just days after winning the North American Soccer League (NASL) is a hammer blow to the league that is desperately scrambling to sign up new clubs for the 2017 season.
By Paul Nicholson
December 8 – CONCACAF is holding another extraordinary congress this Saturday, this time to approve the Confederation’s 2015 audited financial statements, remarkably almost a full year after the financial year ended. The positive from this is presumably that they managed to produce a set of accounts.
By Paul Nicholson
December 8 – The US Department of Justice’s attempts to get former CONCACAF president and FIFA vice president Jack Warner to the US to stand trial looks set to suffer further delay.
December 7 – Mexico’s Liga MX is to start an 18-team women’s league in 2017. President Enrique Bonilla (pictured) said the league will begin with a cup competition in the spring before the formal season begins in September.
December 1 – USL team Arizona United SC are renaming themselves Phoenix Rising FC and preparing to play the 2017 season in a brand new stadium, part of a 15.8 acre soccer complex being developed in the Valley of the Sun.
By Andrew Warshaw and Paul Nicholson
November 22 – A report by Deloitte’s sports business consultancy into ending the closed shop league system in the United States and introducing promotion and relegation in the MLS says that there would be substantial long term gains for the sport and professional game in the country.