Boot This Soccer Policy

The Mexican and Argentine national soccer teams drew almost 100,000 fans to the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum for their 1999 match there--a fine crowd for the Coliseum, which has seen too little of professional sports since the Raiders football team left town in 1995.

The game delivered a cool $1 million in revenue, helping to keep the publicly owned stadium from becoming a drain on local tax receipts. Even the U.S. Soccer Federation, which sanctions international soccer in America, made money, simply by giving its blessing to the game.

So why hasn’t the Coliseum scheduled more top-flight soccer? It’s good for the venue, good for the city and good for businesses in the neighborhood. And most of all, it’s a hit with L.A.’s many soccer fans.

The answer is disappointing. The U.S. Soccer Federation appears to be doing all it can to thwart attempts by the Coliseum Commission to stage a repeat of successes like the Argentina-Mexico game. In April, the U.S. federation canceled a match between European champion Real Madrid and the Mexican national team, fearing that the international match might hurt attendance at an American professional soccer game at the Rose Bowl the same week. “The big picture,” said Jim Moorehouse, the federation’s spokesman, “has to do with protecting the domestic game.”

That policy bars soccer fans from seeing, and paying to see, games they want. Surely the federation must realize that promoting top-rank soccer in Los Angeles and other U.S. cities would create more fans to support the “domestic game.”

The Coliseum Commission has tried and so far failed to persuade the federation to change its rule. Coliseum officials should now consider going to court to force a change. Soccer protectionism is as bad as any other form.