NEW YORK – It was as if Nashville SC CEO Ian Ayre was making his way down the home stretch of a marathon when he spoke at Major League Soccer’s 25th season celebration event Wednesday.
With each passing word, what was, for so long, a distant goal became a clear finish line; what was, for so long, a concept, closing in on becoming a reality.
“In many ways, a lot of still is concept,” Ayre said. “Until you put 11 players on the field and do all the stuff in the stadium on Saturday, it’s all conceptual. The reality will be when the ref blows the whistle, for me. And then, we start measuring ourselves against ourselves, almost.”
Opening night will be some litmus test. More than 50,000 are expected at Nissan Stadium for the first installment of Nashville SC-Atlanta United; a match-up that already has the ingredients of an epic rivalry: proximity, passionate fan support and, yes, even history.
“[Atlanta United President] Darren Eales, we were big old rivals in the Premier League when he was at Tottenham and I was at Liverpool,” Ayre said. “And I think it’s great. It’s going to be a good, friendly, hard rivalry.”
Ayre may have started from scratch in Nashville – even “picking the carpets” – but it’s not as if his experience at an established club like Liverpool hasn’t prepared him for a winding road to success.
It took three head coaches, five years outside the UEFA Champions League and the sale of multiple world class players to build a Liverpool team that is now champions of Europe and chasing an invincible domestic season. It’s taken a similar patience just to guide Nashville here, to the intersection of concept and reality.
“For about 18 months, it was a really slow, methodical process,” Ayre said. “You were thinking about what the organization chart might look like for the front office. You were thinking about the type of players you might want to recruit – but you weren’t really able to recruit them, because you didn’t have an outlet for them.”
The first big domino to fall was Hany Mukhtar, who became the club’s first designated player when he signed in August. Then, in November, players started arriving in twos, threes and fours with trades and the expansion draft. Ayre and Nashville were not only out of neutral, but moving fast.
“It was almost like you were pushing it uphill for 18 months, and then, all of a sudden, six months ago, you start chasing it down the other side,” Ayre said. “People are arriving and buildings are going up and tickets are on sale. So, it’s been two phases, really. It felt like a long, methodical, process-driven 18 months. And then, six months of organized chaos.”
Ayre cannot wait for the opening whistle to end that chaos. Once that finish line is crossed on Saturday night, he can, in a sense, finally begin what he came to Nashville to do.
“[Saturday] is very, very important, and I’m pleased that it is going to be a big success, it is going to be a big spectacle, but it’s one game,” Ayre said. “It’s almost like you want to wake up on Sunday and realize that now you can just run a soccer team in Major League Soccer.”