Charlotte FC owner David Tepper says team would be ready to launch in ’21 without pandemic
Charlotte FC owner David Tepper said Wednesday that the Major League Soccer team would have been ready to play its inaugural season in 2021 if the coronavirus pandemic had not forced a delay. Still, Tepper said he considered the move to push the season to 2022 a beneficial action.
“For a lot of different reasons, I think the league and us determined together that it probably was better that we delay for the next year,” Tepper said. “But I do think that if COVID didn’t come, we would have been ready.”
Tepper said his vision for the start of the season included him marching into Bank of America stadium with fans and “jumping up and down” with them throughout the match. State restrictions due to the pandemic made the goal of maximizing ticket sales and hosting fans at full capacity improbable for 2021. In July, Charlotte FC and Major League Soccer announced the team would push its start date to 2022.
Team president Tom Glick said at the time of the announcement that he saw the delay as helpful to providing more time for roster-building and developing team operations. Tepper, who owns the Carolina Panthers, elaborated on the thinking behind the decision to push the city’s MLS debut while discussing the Panthers on Wednesday.
“When COVID came, just building things became really tough,” Tepper said. “You couldn’t get the delivery of things, so we have to make certain changes for soccer. That alone was tough.”
Those “things” include soccer-specific renovations at Bank of America Stadium, such as the addition of a standing-only Supporters Section, MLS locker rooms and a center tunnel for player entrance. Tepper said that the pandemic pushed back stadium renovation plans.
“With the stadium, with this COVID, it’s pushed everything back,” Tepper said Wednesday. “All the decisions back. The open-air stadium with beautiful weather seem a lot better to me today than they did last year to tell you the truth.”
He also said that revenue originally expected to come in next year from the team is being delayed. Tepper Sports and Entertainment, the organization that owns Charlotte FC and the Panthers, furloughed more than 16 full-time employees and laid off at least three others last month.
“Some of those things were changes that needed to be done for a while,” Tepper said of the furloughs. “And some of those are just responding to the current environment of limited fans.”
The organization is counting on Charlotte FC to bring in a substantial number of fans for its inaugural season when it is able to host events at full capacity.
In late July, the team announced that 28,000 ticket deposits had been placed. Glick said the goal was to fill the lower bowl of the stadium, which he estimated to seat 37,500 fans. The lower bowl, club level and suites account for just over 38,000 seats, according to the stadium website. Fans are able to place deposits, with seat selection still on pace to take place this fall.
Alaina Getzenberg contributed to this report.
This story was originally published September 2, 2020 at 8:02 PM.
