Columnist Steve Carp: Tourism will decide soccer tourney’s fate

Steve Carp

Thursday, July 15, 1999 | 10:24 a.m.

Steve Carp is a Las Vegas Sun sportswriter. Reach him at carp@lasvegassun.com or 259-4087.

So Las Vegas is getting into the soccer business?

Good luck. Especially since it has been tried in different ways for years with virtually no success at the professional level.

We're not talking about youth soccer, which has done extremely well since the initial soccer boom back in the 1970s and continues to grow to this day. And with the tremendous success garnered by the U.S. Women's national team in winning the Women's World Cup, look for those numbers to pick up considerably, especially in the Silver State Girls Soccer League.

What we're talking about here is the soccer promotion business, where people are going to be asked to shell out what figures to be big bucks to watch players they have absolutely no local connection with.

The late Harry Wald had a vision of having the World Cup being played here. While we had to settle for hosting the draw to the 1994 Cup, what will take place here in late September and early October is a small first step in that direction.

The CONCACAF Club Championship is probably a confusing concept to most of you. Even a lot of true soccer fans have trouble keeping up with all the football acronyms that fall under the FIFA banner, which oversees the sport worldwide.

It is a tournament of the best professional teams from the North and Central America and Caribbean areas, 38 countries in all. These are not the national teams where everything is driven by patriotism. In some ways, club soccer is more passionate. The feelings are deep-rooted. The love and hate are very real.

This won't be the lovefest the Women's World Cup was. It's not going to be about 11-year-old girls in ponytails, face paint and Mia Hamm jerseys. This is hard-scrabble, cleats-up, take-no-prisoners soccer, where green is the motivation. The winner is guaranteed a minimum of $1.5 million at the inaugural FIFA World Club Championship in January in Brazil.

Yet Las Vegas Events doesn't want to discourage all you soccer moms from taking your daughters to watch the games at Sam Boyd Stadium. Quite the contrary. LVE would love to see you show up. But what LVE really wants are tourists. They can come from Los Angeles, Arizona, Mexico, even Trinidad & Tobago. But they want those hotel rooms filled, those stands packed and those casinos humming.

That's what they're talking about when they use the words "soccer business." It's not necessarily YOUR business Las Vegas Events seeks, though it won't turn you away. It wants the out-of-town trade.

The question is, will there be enough to make it worthwhile for LVE to stay in the soccer business? It all depends on how much the tickets go for, how much the hotel rooms cost and the ease by which fans can get from the Strip out to the stadium.

If it's reasonable, there's a good chance this may work. If not, LVE will be kicking itself for not pursuing the U.S. Women's victory lap across America a little harder. The Golden Gals are playing an 11-game tour this fall, but Las Vegas is not on the docket.

Too bad. That's something the local populace would have come out for. Instead, we'll make do with the CONCACAF tourney and hope that the more passionate fans from south of the border and beyond leave the plastic bags of urine (which they tend to lob at players, referees and opposing fans) at home. That's a part of the soccer business we can live without.