The Chattanooga Football Club proved Saturday that it can not only successfully host an exhibition game that draws a large crowd, but it can win the game, as well.
An announced crowd of 6,317 spent its Memorial Weekend Saturday night at Finley Stadium watching the second-year amateur soccer team prevail 2-1 against the Under-23 team from the pro squad Fútbol Club Atlas, of Guadalajara, Mexico.
"It was definitely the most fans that almost all of us have ever played in front of," said defender Russell Courtney, who scored on a first-half header. "It was great."
When Chattanooga FC was founded about 18 months ago, not many folks thought the club would draw fans the way it has, co-founder Tim Kelly said. CFC averaged more than 2,000 fans a game last season and Saturday's turnout was the second-largest ever for a soccer game at Finley.
"Everybody kind of rolled their eyes when we said we were going to have semi-pro soccer here, thinking maybe we'd have 500 people," Kelly said. "And it's been, I think, remarkable and surprising to everybody, but we're not going to look a gift horse in the mouth. We're going to keep the momentum up."
Long before Saturday, CFC officials were already thinking about their next big game, and it could come in a matter of weeks. Nothing has been scheduled yet, but the club has had conversations with the Argentinian pro club Estudiantes De La Plata, the top team in South America in 2009.
"I hope this Estudiantes thing comes together later in the summer," Kelly said, though he was quick to point out that CFC's primary goal is to win the National Premier Soccer League title. The club is 1-0 in Southeast Division play and hosts Pumas FC on Saturday.
A special game of some kind is being discussed for next season, right around the time the first car comes off the line at the $1 billion Volkswagen plant in Ooltewah.
Volkswagen Group of America is the title sponsor of CFC, as well as D.C. United of Major League Soccer. Volkswagen also owns the VFL Wolfsburg football club in Germany, which won the Bundesliga (the top German league) last year.
"The timing will be really neat for next year when they make their first car, it will be right around the beginning of the season," co-founder Krue Brock said recently. "We've got a couple of ideas on how to do a great kickoff for their coming here and the start of our season."