Montreal in MLS? Uh, maybe not
Montreal was one of the candidates for an expansion team at the start of the last round but the league quickly said no. The money in that bid was coming from George Gillett, the part owner of Liverpool and the owner of the Montreal Canadiens. Now comes word from Montreal that Gillett, apparently with some financial troubles, may sell the Canadiens.
If he’s considering selling the Canadiens, I’d be surprised if he was looking to instead have an MLS franchise. So it would seem unlikely Montreal would be in the mix this time around.
So the teams that could be in the running for the next spots: St. Louis, Ottawa, Atlanta, New York, Las Vegas. Anyone got any other possible cities?
Meanwhile, MLS Commissioner Don Garber is having a conference call with reporters on Tuesday. One of the topics to be discussed is expansion. We’ll see what he has to say.
Gillett is also to sell off his EPL ties as well. What time is Garber’s conference call?
Tom,
I wouldn’t be surprised to see the Carolinas as an opportunity. There are no teams south of D.C. on the East coast so you know that MLS will want to exploit that as much as possible and pass over St. Louis again!!
Gillett was not “where the money was coming from” in the Montreal bid. Joey Saputo was the lead investor. The Saputo family’s net worth is $2.77 billion.
Conference call is 2pm CT … you can listen in via http://www.mlsnet.com