The recent announcement from Riverside Pro Soccer that it is working with the United Soccer League to bring professional soccer to the Inland region’s largest city has certainly raised eyebrows and voices.
For many in Riverside’s soccer community, the professional club is a long-awaited foray into the highest levels of The Beautiful Game.
“The potential for a soccer project like this and what it would mean for the Riverside community is so significant,” California Baptist University men’s soccer coach Coe Michaelson said. “We have a community that loves soccer.”
The idea that a pro team can lift the region’s soccer profile remains one of the project’s biggest selling points. However, some say without a plan to fix the community’s biggest youth sports issues — the creation and access to quality soccer fields after the stadium site replaces what was the 56-acre Ab Brown Sports Complex — the concept is falling on some deaf ears.
“It still doesn’t solve the problem in this city,” former AYSO Riverside coaching director Brad Crowder said. “It’s fields, fields, fields. There aren’t any in Riverside.”
The project
In August, the Riverside City Council unanimously approved a 12-month negotiating agreement for the proposed project with Riverside-based GCS Development.
With a master plan to convert the 18-field Ab Brown Sports Complex, which has been largely unused for five years. The new facility would include a small number of athletic fields, plus housing, trails and other amenities, according to a city report.
“The field at the Ab Brown sports complex has been a vision for Riverside for a decade, at least,” former Riverside Mayor Rusty Bailey said. “We have made pitches to professional sports teams LAFC and L.A. Galaxy in the past to try to get a team or a minor league team.”
The current vision for the new project is a new regional sports complex with an expandable 5,000-seat professional soccer stadium, two additional soccer fields, an indoor sports and concert complex, housing, retail, recreation, and a central public park area.
“I think it’s viable,” said Bailey, a Riverside native. “I think it has good access points with two freeways, the 215 and the 91 interchange right there.”
The city will work with the developer for the length of the negotiating agreement to discuss the purchase and development of the land proposed for the project.
The proposed stadium would be expandable to 15,000 seats to meet U.S. Soccer’s professional league standards.
“I think the size is right, and I think the location is right,” Bailey said. “Riverside is the capital of Inland Southern California. It’s about time for something like this.”
There also are plans for a hotel and parking lots to accommodate large crowds for games and concerts.
The reaction
With the Ab Brown complex vacant for nearly half a decade, the news that USL is interested surprises as much as it excites.
“Having coached my kids and refereed AYSO games at Ab Brown, and then played in the Pete King League there, it’s all a little unreal,” Crowder said. “Excuse me if I take the approach of, ‘I’ll believe it when I see it.’”
(Stan Lim, The Press-Enterprise/SCNG)
Professional soccer in Riverside has been a rumor that has turned into local myth on the verge of a fairytale.
“I think, being a resident and being in this community for 40 years, we’ve been teased with a moment that was supposed to come 10 years ago, and was supposed to be Chivas USA, right?” Arlington High boys soccer coach Kevin Watson said. “So the fact that now that it’s come back to the table and has been approved, this is just what Riverside and the Inland Empire needs.”
According to 2020 Census data, Hispanics and Latinos are the largest ethnic group in both Riverside County and San Bernardino County, combining to make up more than 50% of the population.
“For soccer especially, when you look at the demographics — and Riverside has a massive percentage of folks with Hispanic heritage — and then you go broader into San Bernardino and Moreno Valley, you’re looking at an even higher percentage,” Bailey said. “Within Hispanic culture, soccer is their No. 1 sport, so I think that it is the right location when you’re looking at demographics.
“It’s an exciting piece of news for any soccer fan in Riverside,” added Bailey, who played and coached at Riverside Poly High.
Not unnoticed, Temecula FC, the longest continuously-operating men’s elite amateur team in the Inland region, followed with an announcement on its social media that it was seeking admission to USL League One, a third division of the Tampa, Fla.-based USL.
The problems
Adjacent to the soccer property is the former Riverside Golf Course. A larger plot at more than 120 acres, the golf course is the focus of the “Northside Project” as the city of Riverside looks to revitalize the neighborhood.
That project calls for housing and shopping, primarily, but with a rafting and surfing-themed adventure park component that includes trails and outdoor spaces for hiking and walking.
Dreamed up by Adrenalin Sports Resorts Collaborative, the venture now awaits an environmental impact study that will play a major part in determining the project’s future. The same holds true for the future of the soccer stadium.
“This project has the potential to transform the Northside, honoring the wishes of the neighborhood while expanding our recreational opportunities for all residents of Riverside,” said Mayor Patricia Lock Dawson in a statement.
With an intent to design the Riverside Adventure Center to Olympic standards so it can apply as a potential host to several LA28 Olympic Game competitions, the venue features spaces for whitewater canoe/kayaking, climbing, skateboarding, BMX cycling, surfing and biathlon.
“With all these millions about to be spent on all of this, wouldn’t it also make sense to include some soccer-specific fields?” Crowder asked. “The waterpark part of it is whatever, but are they going to ignore the soccer legacy while gentrifying the entire neighborhood? Seems like a boondoggle.”
Adds Michaelson: “Our youth have to travel out of the city to find a nice facility for tournaments. Up to this moment, that’s been a lot of lost potential for Riverside residents and businesses, both culturally and economically.”
Riverside Ward 1 Councilperson Philip Falcone contends that soccer has remained central in the planning process for the Ab Brown complex.
“The idea of continuing that soccer legacy on this property is very personal to my bosses in the Northside, as it is for many Riversiders,” Falcone said.
The potential
The game — soccer, futbol, calcio — will be everywhere next summer when the FIFA World Cup arrives in North America for the first time since 1994.
Riverside Pro Soccer’s USL announcement in conjunction with the stadium site plan has the potential to connect the Inland region to a global community.
“Exposure to the professional game only adds to the local experience and helps build the culture of the world’s most impactful and popular sport,” Michaelson said.
Currently, the Inland area’s best young collegiate players flock to USL League Two amateur team Redlands FC, but once they turn 23 years old they either retire or leave for playing opportunities elsewhere. Riverside Pro Soccer will provide a professional pathway for local players.
“You look at the universities, both Division 1, I think it’d be great,” Bailey said. “Maybe they can have a larger community, and maybe there’ll be some opportunities for them to go to a big stadium and get a larger audience.
“It’s a great opportunity to commit to the soccer community and the universities and even the local high schools,” Bailey said. “For CIF championship games it’d be great, too.”
Much like life, soccer is about connections. Right now, Riverside’s pro soccer lifeline has a connection to the USL.
“I think it’s exciting that it’s connected with USL, which has a unique opportunity with its promotion-relegation pyramid,” Watson said. “I’m just excited. I’m ecstatic. The European model coming to Riverside is definitely one of the coolest things to have happened.”
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