Only 746 people attended the Impact Minnesota Stars game

[Alberto7]

http://impactmontreal.com/Tracker/Tracker.aspx?GameID=205&language=EN

Wow, this really surprised me when I saw it. Why are they having such a hard time attracting people?

[devioustrevor]

Aren't all the USSF-2 teams not in Montreal or the Pacific Northwest struggling at the gate?

St. Louis and Crystal Palace Baltimore are in danger of folding and now the league is expanding to a place closer to Venezuela than Miami. To a city of 31,000 in a country of 86,000.

[the biologist]

Their lowest attendance number last year was 2,143 and they had an avg. of 3,209. I don't know how to explain this drop. Apart from their home opener, their best crowd was 1,576 this season. Ouch ! Is the ownership change (and the Thunder brand BTW) the lone reason for this ?

USSF D2 Attendance (2008 to 2010)

Why are they having such a hard time attracting people?

I'm asking myself the same question...

[jloome]

Affiliating them with the National Sports Centre officially was just dumb. Downplays their professionalism seriously. Then there's absolutely dreadful atmosphere you get at a "Family" facility relative to a proper football park, even with the conversion they made.

Plus, it's hell and gone in the suburbs, in Blaine.

There are so many reasons why the NASL/USl is destined to fail if it doesn't wake up and recognize that you have to spend money to make money at football in North America, and simply offering something up is not enough anymore. These teams have to do their homework and wake up.

Notable that Steve Ralston quit AC St. Louis Tuesday and is heading back to the Revs.

[Lord Bob]

Well, AC St. Louis is another ball of wax entirely. They just have a sleazebag owner with no money and will lucky to be get through the season (basically, they're the Edmonton Aviators).

[jloome]

Well, AC St. Louis is another ball of wax entirely. They just have a sleazebag owner with no money and will lucky to be get through the season (basically, they're the Edmonton Aviators).

Aviators owners weren't sleazebags, they just hired incompetents who ran them into the ground in a half-dozen games. The losses they'd already experienced by that point could carry an NASL team for an entire year, which is why they pulled out.

[Trident]

D&G post about last night's game:

http://dragonsandgulls.wordpress.com/2010/06/10/back-to-montreal/

[Trillium]

Aviators owners weren't sleazebags, they just hired incompetents who ran them into the ground in a half-dozen games. The losses they'd already experienced by that point could carry an NASL team for an entire year, which is why they pulled out.

If you hire incompetents and give them a box of cash and dont watch the expenditures as an owner your incompetent or looking for a huge tax write off, likely more then was in the cash box to begin.

Give your head a shake, if you are not a good business man dont get into sports minor or major expecting to make money you will not you will lose your shirt and deserve too.

[jloome]

If you hire incompetents and give them a box of cash and dont watch the expenditures as an owner your incompetent or looking for a huge tax write off, likely more then was in the cash box to begin.

Give your head a shake, if you are not a good business man dont get into sports minor or major expecting to make money you will not you will lose your shirt and deserve too.

GIve MY head a shake? I'm sure you weren't intending to be insulting (and, if you were, go **** yourself).

There were 19 investors, all absentee. So the individual losses were in the hundreds of thousands, which wasn't going to break any of them. Economies of scale: some guys have so much money that aa few hundred grand isn't a big deal.

As for the "If you hire incompetents and give them a box of cash and dont watch the expenditures as an owner your incompetent" he didn't say incompetent, he said *******s.

As for their competency as owners, I'm quite sure they were extremely incompetent, like about two-thirds of sports ownership groups out there.

[Trillium]

GIve MY head a shake? I'm sure you weren't intending to be insulting (and, if you were, go **** yourself).

There were 19 investors, all absentee. So the individual losses were in the hundreds of thousands, which wasn't going to break any of them. Economies of scale: some guys have so much money that aa few hundred grand isn't a big deal.

As for the "If you hire incompetents and give them a box of cash and dont watch the expenditures as an owner your incompetent" he didn't say incompetent, he said *******s.

As for their competency as owners, I'm quite sure they were extremely incompetent, like about two-thirds of sports ownership groups out there.

So 19 owners dump 100k each over six weeks, and take the business loss to apply to taxes owed to the province and feds, so who paid for the Aviators failures... you and me, but mostly the federal we.... who kick in more bucks to pay taxes when some business man takes a flyer on an investment.

You can bet the tax accountants made the losses look a lot bigger then the real cash paid out...

[Mr.Caca]

I think I read on Inside Minnesota Soccer that the price of the tickets tripled (they were 5$ before).

[jloome]

So 19 owners dump 100k each over six weeks, and take the business loss to apply to taxes owed to the province and feds, so who paid for the Aviators failures... you and me, but mostly the federal we.... who kick in more bucks to pay taxes when some business man takes a flyer on an investment.

You can bet the tax accountants made the losses look a lot bigger then the real cash paid out...

Tax law doesn't work as loosely as in the U.S., so this probably isn't the case. And I interviewed these people. To a man, they were shocked by the losses and not happy at all. Plus, some of them were actually among the creditors, as they supplied services in kind.

It wasn't an investment scam and, aside from the obvious stupidity of being an absentee investor, the Aviators lies entierly on the shoulders of the guys who were running it. The level of management incompetence was considerable.

[Trillium]

Tax law doesn't work as loosely as in the U.S., so this probably isn't the case. And I interviewed these people. To a man, they were shocked by the losses and not happy at all. Plus, some of them were actually among the creditors, as they supplied services in kind.

It wasn't an investment scam and, aside from the obvious stupidity of being an absentee investor, the Aviators lies entierly on the shoulders of the guys who were running it. The level of management incompetence was considerable.

I suspect the valuation of assests included club player contracts which became 0 valued assets at wind up, those asset losses would have been attributed by a good tax accountant which i assume the owners finally realized then needed when it all went south. I again say i suspect the federal tax payer picked up a lot of the losses.

Are you a business reporter who interviewed all nineteen to cover an embarassing bankruptcy ?

[jloome]

I suspect the valuation of assests included club player contracts which became 0 valued assets at wind up, those asset losses would have been attributed by a good tax accountant which i assume the owners finally realized then needed when it all went south. I again say i suspect the federal tax payer picked up a lot of the losses.

Are you a business reporter who interviewed all nineteen to cover an embarassing bankruptcy ?

No, just a handful for a piece I was working on for my paper a few years ago. Long and complicated story that turned into several long and complicated stories which for reasons that'll go in a book someday never saw print.