The U.S. importance to the FIFA World Cup

The U.S. soccer market is growing rapidly and is already one of the greatest economic powers of the modality worldwide.

There are many factors that have resulted in this: growth of school-age practice, structured pro league, urban youth interest, strong appeal to Latinos, U.S. players exports to European leagues.

This Qatar World Cup will show high impacts from the U.S., an increasingly important market for the football industry.

FIFA World Cup in U.S. - Total Audience- Million

According to FIFA,, at the 2014 World Cup 105 million Americans watched the World Cup held in Brazil. The total audience was 79 million at the 2006 World Cup in Germany. Around 30 million new fans in two events.

In 2018, without the U.S. team participation the TV audience dropped 37%.

Currently, USA is behind only China and Brazil as TV audience generator to the FIFA World Cup.

Youth interest in soccer?

A key point of soccer's success in the USA is the young people practice, including girls.

In the USA there are already more than 25 million soccer practitioners in a recurring way. More than Brazil and Germany, for example.

Gallup's recent data show that 11% of the youngsters are soccer fans, compared to 6% in baseball.?Among this population, soccer and basketball are tied.

Sports interest in U.S.- Gallup

YouGov Sport recent analysis showed how important is soccer practice in U.S. (Under 18 y.o.)

MLS Strength

The MLS professional league has helped a lot to popularize soccer in the country and today only to enter the league the investor needs to pay US$ 325 million.

The value was US$ 50 million 10 years ago.

According to Sportico, the combined 28 MLS teams are worth US$ 16.3 billion. LAFC is the most valuable with US$ 900 million, followed by LA Galaxy US$ 865 million and Atlanta United US$ 855 million.

The less valuable franchise, Montreal worth US$ 390 million.

The new broadcast contract with Apple TV will increase revenues and the business size. MLS audiences are young and connected to streaming broadcasts.

Apple will pay a minimum of US$ 250 million per season. Previously, the League received around US$ 100 million per year for its broadcasts.

Allways make sense, the U.S. soccer growth!