Filed under: European Soccer, MLS, US Soccer, UEFA Champions League
We love a good MLS format debate, and it looks like those trouble-making Russians are going to stir up one of the genre’s greatest hits.
On Monday, Russian Football Union president Sergei Fursenko announced that the country’s leagues will switch from the calendar-year season to the fall-to-spring season starting next year. Cue the would-be American soccer reformers and Eurosnobs, who argue that a similar switch in the U.S. would be beneficial to the game’s growth at home. If Russia has seen the European light, then surely MLS should as well.
“The change of the championship to the ‘autumn-spring’ format will allow the Premier League to determine the national champion at the same time as the majority of European countries,” Fursenko said. If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.
Interestingly, players and Russia’s second and third divisions are opposed to the move. The lower leagues claimed the nation’s stadium infrastructure isn’t suitable for staging games during a larger portion of the Russian winter, according to Reuters, while Agence France Presse said the players’ union is “seriously concerned by the haste of the RFU decision to change the championship’s format.”
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