Former Tampa Bay Rowdies chief executive Nick Sakiewicz suggests Florida is now certainly ready for Major League Soccer.
With the announcement of central Florida outfit Orlando City becoming MLS' 21st franchise, the now-Philadelphia Union CEO feels that the dissolved Rowdies of the mid-1990s should have no negative bearing on the popularity of the Lions who will enter the top league in 2015.
"All of those kids playing soccer through the '80s and '90s are not kids anymore," he told MLSsoccer.com.
"Now those 15-year-olds are 35 and 40 and they're season-ticket holders and they support Orlando City as a USL [PRO] team. The market has really grown up. I think it's the same story in pretty much any MLS market."
Sakiewicz added: "I think that whole corridor, from Tampa to Orlando, is just filled with soccer fans.
"We started to show some really good things in Tampa but it was a different time. Now there are even more fans in that corridor. I think [Tampa] is going to be a great market from Orlando City to draw from, as well as the exploding Orlando market."
