American soccer writing, history & data.
At the end of the 1988 season, the Western Soccer Alliance began to work seriously towards becoming a fully professional league. In late July of 1988, the league granted an expansion franchise to the Phoenix-area, Arizona Condors, which would begin play in the 1989 season. Its owner, Tony Koleski, planned to initially fill the team's roster with junior college players but hoped to turn the team pr...
The same six teams returned for the 1988 Western Soccer Alliance season. The teams would play home-and-home series against each other plus two games against Canadian Soccer League clubs. The games against the Calgary Kickers and Vancouver 86ers would count in the league standings. In a slight change from the prior season, matches tied at regulation would go to two mandatory, not sudden death, 10-m...
The Western Soccer Alliance returned for the 1987 season with a number of changes from the prior year. The Edmonton Brick Men did to return as the team joined the newly-formed Canadian Soccer League. For the first time the league implemented a playoffs. The second and third place teams would face off in a semifinal with the winner playing the first-place team for the league championship. The regul...
After a successful opening season as an relatively informal alliance, the Western Soccer Association returned for the 1986 season as a true league. The purposed of the league was to give American players the chance to play outdoors as each team was required to start at least nine Americans in their starting lineups. Peter Bridgewater of the San Jose Earthquakes was named the first president of the...
Following the collapse of the NASL the Pacific Western Soccer Alliance was proposed as a fully professional league. The Vancouver Nationals, Edmonton and Calgary teams each posted the necessary $50,000 financial guarantees with the Canadian Soccer Association but the fourth entity, the Seattle Americans, merged in late February 1985 with the F.C. Seattle United club and were not prepared to join a...
©2024 by Daniel Creel. All rights reserved.