MLS set to expand to Montreal

Major League Soccer isn’t giving any specifics, but there’s a press conference slated for Friday (we hear it’s in Montreal) for a “major announcement” (we hear it’s about expanding into Montreal for the 2012 season).

This is not unexpected news, nor is it a surprise that MLS commissioner Don Garber keeps saying Atlanta is on his mind for possible expansion some time down the road.

We’ve been hearing this, of course, since the inception of MLS in 1996. Atlanta has always been a market the league wants to capture, and the city is among those vying to make the final cut for the U.S. Soccer Federation’s 2018 or 2022 World Cup venue list. It’s one of the stronger candidates, in fact.

At some point, however, any discussion of MLS viability in Atlanta has to go beyond employing the usual buzzwords — like “market” — and touting all the ballyhooed numbers of youth players, various clusters of immigrant communities and the city’s history of staging big sporting events.

Atlanta also has to demonstrate that some kind of organic groundswell of a fan base exists to be worthy of having a franchise. It’s unlikely that anything like what has happened in Seattle will be replicated here, primarily because poorly-run (men’s) teams haven’t given Atlanta soccer fans much to cheer. Or, as the case is now, a team to cheer at all.

Seattle, Toronto and Vancouver — which like Montreal competed with Atlanta in the USL — have demonstrated outstanding turnout and organized, reliable team management.

To a certain degree, Montreal could provide something of a template for Atlanta since the Quebec city used big events as a springboard for the crowds the Impact have been drawing in recent years.

Somewhere, somehow, big-time soccer triggered fans to begin supporting the local team in big, lasting numbers.

Atlanta soccer boosters are hoping for the same, eyeing more big events, such as a post-World Cup friendly at the Georgia Dome between Club America and Manchester City.

In lieu of there not being a pro men’s team at all, there’s not a better option.