Lights’ New Coach Wants to Stabilize Roster and Forge Stronger Connections with Las Vegas
By ALAN SNEL
LVSportsBiz.com
It was the inaugural season for the Las Vegas Lights FC and the soccer team drew about 7,000 fans or so a game to its downtown home at Cashman Field in 2018 — a respectable attendance mark that was among the top 10 attendance in the United Soccer League.
But the Lights’ strong attendance came amid a topsy-turvy season of instability that included a high-profile coach who quit before the season ended and a soccer club that won only eight of its 34 games while losing 19 and tying another seven.
The season was known more for crazy antics than superior play on the pitch, from former coach Jose Luis Sanchez Sola smoking a cigarette with fans after he was tossed out of a home game to unconventional sponsor partnerships that included a downtown Las Vegas dispensary to a colorful goalie who make mad dashes up the field (and tackled an opponent, too).
So, owner Brett Lashbrook changed the narrative overnight this week when the upbeat Lights owner hired U.S. soccer icon Eric Wynalda, 49, to coach a team in dire need of stability after 39 players wore the club’s jersey this past season.
LVSportsBiz.com spoke with Wynalda Thursday morning about the changes that will be necessary to stabilize the young soccer club and strengthen a fan base. The highlights included:
^ Reaching out to suburban soccer clubs from Summerlin to the northwest valley to Henderson to get more white soccer moms to bring their kids to Lights games. The soccer team’s fans at its home games were about 70 percent Latino, but Lashbrook acknowledged during the season that the Lights had to do a better job at attracting the white suburban soccer fans, too.
^ Stabilizing a roster that saw nearly 40 players don the Lights black jersey with pink fluorescent highlights. Wynalda, a three-time U.S. World Cup player and former soccer commentator, said it was hard for fans to connect with so many players who are coming and going.
^ Creating more defensive structure on the field. Sola, also known as “El Chelis,” promised a high-scoring, fast-paced team. But the team was not high-scoring and suffered on the defensive side of the field, sometimes allowing goals in the final minutes of games. Wynalda said he wants to focus first on defense.
ADVERTISEMENT
Wynalda knows Las Vegas well because he has a home here and said there’s a handful of local soccer big wigs that he wants to have lunch with to draw more fans to Cashman Field.
Lashbrook has big plans for Cashman, which the owner wants to redevelop into a soccer-only venue. He hopes to remove the outfield walls in centerfield and rightfield and build more soccer seating there to create a U-shaped configuration around the pitch.
*
Follow LVSportsBiz.com on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. Contact LVSportsBiz.com publisher/writer Alan Snel at asnel@LVSportsBiz.com
