Austin FC is ready and set to start their journey in Major Soccer League, the new franchise will be the 27th team to join the MLS. The club located in the Texas capital will officially join the 2021 season.

FC Dallas and the Houston Dynamos are the two franchises that “the lone star state” already has in the MLS and will soon have a third team joining them. Even though that Austin is the 11th most populous city in the USA, the city never had a professional sport team but will be from now of one represented by Austin FC.

The team’s colors will be green, white and black and will play their official home games at the McKalla Place located in the northern part of the city.

The club hasn’t played one game yet but is already one of the most hated teams in the MLS, the reason being Anthony Precourt. The former owner of the Columbus Crew wanted to relocate the in Ohio based club and move it to the Texas capital.

The City of Columbus didn’t provide for a publicly funded stadium and that was one of the reasons for Precourt to move the club away. The fans of “The Crew” of course didn’t want their team to move out of their city and especially not to another state and blamed Precourt of keeping their club hostage. Cleveland Browns owners Jimmy and Dee Haslam ended up buying the “The Crew” and helped them to stay in Columbus.

Other cities like Sacramento, St Louis and Phoenix were all waiting for the last spot in the MLS, but unfortunately for the citizens of those cities they might end up without a soccer team in the MLS. The MLS rewarded Precourt with a new franchise even though most of the supporters of the other team were against the plan.

The city of Austin, the mayor and the new fans of the club are on the opposing side, and are very happy with the new major sport franchise.

The mayor of Austin, Steve Adler even declared January 15th to “Austin FC Day.”

“It is not only about sports” Adler said. “It is about having a place, a team an event, a shared experience that brings everybody together from all parts of this city,” Adler said during the press release.

Austin FC still has two years to create a team and a vision before joining the MLS and will hope that they can make a good first impression in the league. The franchise would hope to have a good start like the two recent teams that joined the league LAFC and Atlanta United, by qualifying for the playoff or even win the league.

A lot will be determined by the signings, the new coach and how it will fit together but the excitement level is very high in the “City of the violet crown”. The addition of the 27th team in the MLS is showing that soccer is becoming more popular in the United States.