Charlotte FC: the new MLS team hoping for 75,000 fans at their home opener

A pleasant North Carolina day in December 2019 began with Commissioner Don Garber appearing in Charlotte to officially award the city an MLS franchise. Also at the event was David Tepper, the billionaire owner of the newly minted Charlotte FC and the NFL’s Carolina Panthers. The day ended with Tepper surrounded by crazed Charlotte FC fans – literally day one fans – at a brewery where it wasn’t easy to identify who among the crowd was the man cutting the $325m expansion fee check.

Charlotte FC were little more than a theoretical concept on that day. Eight months ago, the team had no coach. Three months ago, they had only a handful of players. Five weeks ago, the coaching staff and players met together for the first time.

Pandemic be damned, Charlotte FC are here. And if they don’t yet have your attention, they soon will as they aim to set a new MLS single-game record for attendance with just under 75,000 at Bank of America Stadium on 5 March for their home opener.

It didn’t happen by accident, nor did it come with a little frustration along the way.

“I feel good, I feel positive,” Charlotte FC’s sporting director Zoran Krneta says. “I mean, this is a group of players that saw each other for the first time three weeks ago. No one knew each other, more or less.”

Charlotte certainly haven’t been boring during their time in the limelight this offseason. They have acquired a number of intriguing players, such as Spanish central midfielder Sergio Ruiz; Christian Fuchs, who won a Premier League title with Leicester City; and rising talents from South America including Ecuadorians Jordy Alcivar and Alan Franco, plus Brazilian teenage forward Vinicius Mello.

A few weeks after preseason opened, though, Charlotte had filled just one