{"id":34619,"date":"2015-05-12T08:35:06","date_gmt":"2015-05-12T12:35:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/?p=34619"},"modified":"2015-05-12T08:38:13","modified_gmt":"2015-05-12T12:38:13","slug":"report-hartford-to-join-nasl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/?p=34619","title":{"rendered":"Report: Hartford to Join NASL"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nesoccertoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/Hartford-1.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"34622\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/?attachment_id=34622\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nesoccertoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/Hartford-1.png?fit=600%2C415&amp;ssl=1\" data-orig-size=\"600,415\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"Hartford-1\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nesoccertoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/Hartford-1.png?fit=300%2C208&amp;ssl=1\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nesoccertoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/Hartford-1.png?fit=600%2C415&amp;ssl=1\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nesoccertoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/Hartford-1.png?resize=600%2C415\" alt=\"Hartford-1\" width=\"600\" height=\"415\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-34622\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nesoccertoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/Hartford-1.png?w=600&amp;ssl=1 600w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nesoccertoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/Hartford-1.png?resize=300%2C208&amp;ssl=1 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" data-recalc-dims=\"1\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Pro soccer appears to be on the verge of returning to Connecticut&#8217;s capital after a report surfaced on Monday that Hartford will be granted an NASL expansion team as early as next year.<\/p>\n<p>According to Fox CT, the franchise will play its home games at Dillon Stadium, and will be named Hartford City FC. <\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" lang=\"en\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/NASL?src=hash\">#NASL<\/a> is coming to Hartford&#8230; Want to know the name of the team? I&#39;ll tell you on the News at 5 on <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/FoxCT\">@FoxCT<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Rich Coppola (@richcoppola) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/richcoppola\/status\/597866656640180225\">May 11, 2015<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p> <script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" lang=\"en\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/jimmystagger\">@jimmystagger<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/FoxCT\">@FoxCT<\/a> I&#39;m told it will be Hartford City FC<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Rich Coppola (@richcoppola) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/richcoppola\/status\/597899458588868610\">May 11, 2015<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p> <script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>A representative from Hartford City FC declined to comment on the report, citing non disclosure agreements with &#8220;different leagues.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Not long after the report surfaced, the league issued a statement in regards to potential expansion to Hartford.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The NASL can confirm that it has received ownership interest from numerous groups in the Hartford area,&#8221; read the release. &#8220;While the league believes it would be a great market for a new club, nothing has been finalized with any of the groups.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Last month, <em>The Courant<\/em> reported that an ownership group from Hartford met with NASL officials about fielding a franchise in the city. However, NASL commissioner Bill Peterson did not go into specifics about the group, nor did he confirm whether Hartford was being targeted as an expansion market.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI personally believe Hartford would be a highly successful market,\u201d Peterson told <em>The Courant<\/em> last month. \u201cIt has a long track record of drawing great crowds for soccer matches, whether it\u2019s U.S. soccer or some of the exhibitions that have been held over the years. There\u2019s great participation and a great following for the national teams, and there\u2019s a great following for professional teams. So we\u2019re pretty confident that a team there in that area, put together correctly, managed correctly, would be very successful.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>On Monday, a source told <em>NESoccerToday.com<\/em> that the league has been interested in the Hartford market &#8220;for some time.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Dillon Stadium is an 80-year-old facility that is located in Hartford\u2019s Colt Park. The stadium would require a number of renovations before serving as host to a professional soccer team.<\/p>\n<p>Despite that obstacle, Peterson believes that the city would be receptive to hosting professional soccer.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think it\u2019s a fantastic sports market,\u201d Peterson said. \u201cI think there are a lot of sports fans in the Hartford area. I like it from a business perspective because the companies that are there are very supportive of the community and teams with the community, the media companies that are there \u2026 you end up with a statewide deal.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Hartford once served as the home to an original NASL franchise. The Hartford Bicentennials played one season at Dillon Stadium from 1975-76 before it moved to New Haven. The franchise relocated to Oakland after the 1977 season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>According to a report, Hartford will field an expansion team in NASL in 2016. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34622,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[138],"tags":[891,1090,1303,892],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nesoccertoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/Hartford-1.png?fit=600%2C415&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34619"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=34619"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34619\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34626,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34619\/revisions\/34626"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/34622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=34619"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=34619"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=34619"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}