The new US Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, Minnesota, will play host to a midweek match-up between England’s Premier League club Chelsea and Italian Serie A giants AC Milan. Sources told NP, this will be the first-ever event at the new $1.061 billion stadium and will be played in early August.
It is believed that plans for the match will be finalized by next week with news of the 2016 International Champions Cup competition and venues being announced toward the end of March. The new US Bank Stadium, which will be the home to the Minnesota Vikings NFL team, will have a capacity of 66,200. The playing surface for soccer is said to be 115 by 74 yards.
The game will be hosted by the International Champions Cup who brought Manchester City and Olympiacos to TCF Bank Stadium in 2014. That game drew a crowd of 34,047 but only after tickets were discounted due to sluggish sales. While Manchester City has had recent success in England and UEFA Champions League they still lack a large US following, particularly in the Midwest. Greek Super League champions Olympiacos also has a minimal following in most of the US except for pockets of the country with Greek immigrant populations.
The Chelsea – AC Milan match-up should draw far better than the 2014 game. Chelsea has a large US following and has won the Premier League title four times since 2005. In their 111 year history, they’ve won the FA Cup seven times and took home their first Champions League trophy in 2012. Chelsea is said to have 21,4 million supporters in Europe, the fourth highest, and has over 135 million fans worldwide.
AC Milan is a team even older than Chelsea. The storied club was founded in 1899 and have been Serie A champions 18 times and have won the European Cup seven times. They have 18.4 million fans in Europe and are 6th in the world with 99 million supporters.
Attendance to the event could also be helped by an interest in the 1,700,000 square foot US Bank Stadium itself and will allow soccer fans a first look at the facility – possibly even before Vikings fans walk through the doors of the venue.
Several sources reported that both teams are refusing to play on the new Field Turf surface so grass will have to be shipped in and rolled out just for the single game. According to those sources, the Vikings would have preferred the teams play on newly installed turf.
Another source reported that US Bank Stadium, which is managed by SMG, will be trying to bring other soccer events into the new US Bank Stadium. Rumors of a game with the US Women’s National Team have been surfacing. They hope to play sometime after the team returns from the Olympics which take place in Brazil from August 5th to the 21st. Details of that event have not been completed nor verified.
Minnesota United announced this past week that they too will be hosting another international match. For the second consecutive year, United is bringing in Mexico’s Liga MX team, Club Leon. That match will be played at Target Field which is the first soccer game to be played in the Minnesota Twins baseball stadium. That match will take place on June 25th.
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