Gold Cup prelims would be perfect event for new Memphis soccer stadium

In October of 2022, news broke that the City of Memphis and various sporting entities in town would be going to the Tennessee legislature with a “Big Ask” of funding for a total of four stadium projects in Memphis. Those projects are renovations to FedEx Forum, renovations to Simmons Bank Liberty Stadium, renovations to AutoZone Park and a new soccer-specific stadium on the site of the Mid-South Coliseum.

In an interview with World Soccer Talk in November, Memphis 901 FC President Craig Unger discussed a wide range of things about the potential stadium, but one thing he was emphatic about was that getting a new soccer-specific stadium would help get more soccer events to Memphis in addition to 901 FC games. One event he mentioned specifically was the Gold Cup.

The Gold Cup is the regional tournament for teams in CONCACAF (for college basketball fans, think of it as a conference tournament), which encompasses North America, Central America, the Caribbean, and the few tiny nations in the northeastern part of South America. It’s an event that was first played in 1991 and has been held every two years since 2003. It is always played almost entirely in the US, with the occasional game in Canada. Frequently, the newest and shiniest soccer stadiums are used a host venues. For example, the US group stage game against St. Kitts & Nevis this year will be played at the brand new CityPark in St. Louis and the US semi-final against Qatar in 2021 was played at Q2 Stadium in Austin, Texas which had only opened one month prior.

A new wrinkle was added to the Gold Cup for the 2021 edition of the tournament. A preliminary round was introduced where some of the smaller teams in CONCACAF could qualify for the Gold Cup. This is the type of international soccer event that would be perfect for the potential new soccer stadium in Memphis to host.

Given the proposed smaller nature of the stadium (between 7,500 and 8,500 fixed seats according to Unger last November) it seems unlikely that CONCACAF would put group stage or knockout round games in the stadium, given that all of the soccer-specific stadiums they typically choose seat around 20,000 (the smallest venue for this year’s Gold Cup is Shell Energy Stadium in Houston, Texas with a capacity of 22,039). But 2021 and 2023 Gold Cup preliminary games were played at DRV PNK Stadium in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida which is home to Inter Miami. It’s an 18,000 seat venue that has proven to be far too big to regularly fill for this event.

Just how hard has it for these particular games to draw fans in south Florida? Let’s take a look:

2021

Date	Match-Up	Attendance
7/2/21	Haiti vs. St. Vincent & the Grenadines	2,601
7/2/21	Bermuda vs. Barbados	2,025
7/2/21	Trinidad & Tobago vs. Montserrat	7,425
7/3/21	Guadeloupe vs. Bahamas	100
7/3/21	French Guiana vs. Cuba	N/A
7/3/21	Guatemala vs. Guyana	17,161
7/6/21	Trinidad & Tobago vs. French Guiana	1,124
7/6/21	Haiti vs. Bermuda	3,448
7/6/21	Guadeloupe vs. Guatemala	3,571

Of the eight Gold Cup preliminary games that actually got played in 2021 (Cuba was forced to forfeit their game against French Guiana before kickoff due to roster issues) only one of them looked good in an 18,000 seat stadium. In fact the eight games averaged 4,682 fans per game meaning, on average, the stadium was only 26% full.

This year’s edition is harder to gauge because no attendance figures were released, with the only thing close being Michelle Kaufman of the Miami Herald describing Puerto Rico’s support against Martinique as “a spirited fan group in the stands”.

2023

Date	Match-Up	Attendance
6/16/23	Guadeloupe vs. Antigua & Barbuda	N/A
6/16/23	Martinique vs. St. Lucia	N/A
6/16/23	St. Kitts & Nevis vs. Curacao	N/A
6/17/23	French Guiana vs. St. Maarten	N/A
6/17/23	Puerto Rico vs. Suriname	N/A
6/17/23	Guyana vs. Grenada	N/A
6/20/23	Guadeloupe vs. Guyana	N/A
6/20/23	Martinique vs. Puerto Rico	N/A
6/20/23	St. Kitts & Nevis vs. French Guiana	N/A

Nine games were played this year but attendance figures were not available for any of them. That does make it hard to give any sort of concrete facts, but a picture is worth a thousand words:

It’s also worth noting that, while attendance figures for this year may not be available, nobody in any sport in any country in the world ever works to keep good attendance news quiet. There is very clearly a lack of interest in this type of event in the Miami area. So why not move it to Memphis and play it in the brand new soccer stadium here?

This is the type of event that Memphis very rarely gets. Memphis prides itself on being a basketball town but has never been awarded the NBA All-Star Game nor hosted a pre-Olympic USA basketball game and hasn’t hosted NCAA Tournament games since 2017. The University of Memphis football program has been passed over time and time again in conference realignment and is currently in its third dalliance with the Big XII Conference. There isn’t an NFL team or venue here meaning some of the biggest concert acts typically choose Nissan Stadium in Nashville over Memphis (the May 10th Taylor Swift concert and the May 19th joint Stevie Nicks/Billy Joel show being the two most recent examples). The St. Jude Classic golf tournament was elevated to a WGC event in 2019 (with all of the best golfers not named Tiger Woods in the world participating) but that only lasted a couple years before it was bumped back down to a regular tour event. AutoZone Park did get to play host to baseball’s AAA National Championship Game in 2019 but hasn’t had the AAA All-Star Game since 2003 and back in 2016 was passed over for the SEC Baseball Tournament in favor of Hoover, Alabama.

Obviously the teams involved in the Gold Cup prelims are not the type of draw that the US and Mexico are. But surely the crowds in Memphis would be better than the dozen or so people that these games drew in Miami this year. 901 FC has averaged 4,831 all-time for games down at AutoZone Park and had three games just last season crack 6,000 fans. Of the combined 17 Gold Cup preliminary games in Miami, only two have cracked 6,000 fans (and in fact those same two games are the only one to draw better than what 901 FC averages). Now, it’s probably not reasonable here in Memphis to expect 6,000 people to show up for every single game. But since this is the type of event that Memphis rarely gets, there could be a healthy amount of interest locally both from fans and the media.

Would a hypothetical game between say Suriname and Barbados sell out the proposed soccer stadium in Memphis? Probably not. Would it do better than the 40 or so people that this year’s games drew? Definitely. If nothing else for CONCACAF it would look better optically. 1,000 people in a 7,500 seat stadium looks a lot fuller than 1,000 people in an 18,000 seat stadium. But there is a solid soccer community here in Memphis. And between a solid soccer community and interest in the type of event that Memphis doesn’t typically get, the Memphis soccer stadium would be the perfect place to host future Gold Cup preliminary rounds.