Is Hawaii ready for big-time soccer?
Will it ever be ready for big-time soccer?
Takehiko Nakamura is betting on it, for the third time. The president of Blue United Corp. calls this the “last market” for the world’s most popular sport. He even wrote a master’s thesis on it at the University of Massachusetts.
His goals for this year seem modest, but in the long run they are big. The organizer/owner of the Pacific Rim Cup soccer event Thursday and Saturday featuring Major League Soccer and Japan pros is realistic about expected attendance.
And, he says there are “no problems at all” with the field at Aloha Stadium.
History shows that without the drawing power of a big-name star who transcends the sport, like Pele or David Beckham, even high-level soccer will attract just a few thousand here. Nakamura’s goal of 4,000 spectators for Thursday’s matches and 6,000 for Saturday are in line with what a similar event for which he was a consultant, the Hawaiian Islands Invitational, drew in 2012.
His 2020 vision is much wider. Nakamura’s plan is to start local this year; expand in 2019, including a large Japanese presence; and then, in the final year of a three-year agreement with the Hawaii Tourism Authority, market to the entire world.
“Developing a property takes time,” he said. “People have to experience it and understand it.”
The HTA believes in Nakamura’s plan and his tenacity. It is providing $300,000 in sponsorship this year and possibly again the next two years.
“We’re getting a really good deal, considering the original strategy,” said HTA Vice President Leslie Dance, noting the agency paid about twice as much to support the Hawaiian Islands Invitational six years ago. “I think this has been a start-stop kind of thing, so we’re really now 100 percent thinking of the three-tier vision.”
Vancouver and Columbus of Major League Soccer and Iwaki and Consadole Sapporo of Japan play high-level soccer. But is it enough to interest the typical Hawaii sports fan?
“It’s not going to be sold out, by any imagination, but it will help establish a foothold for pro soccer,” Dance said. “We do that with everything we do. We look for ways to not make it a one-off, but something to sustain and grow. We’ll be looking for ways to grow it and be better and better every year.”
Ten years ago Nakamura’s idea became reality — but a short-lived one.
A 2008 tournament called the Pan Pacific Championships featured superstar Beckham of the Los Angeles Galaxy and hometown hero Brian Ching of the Houston Dynamo. Like the Pacific Rim Cup, plans were that it would be the first of three annual events here. But it was played in Los Angeles the next year.
No field of dreams
The condition of the field played into that decision.
“We are very disappointed with the field surface,” MLS Commissioner Don Garber told the Honolulu Advertiser on the second day of the tournament. “Our players said it was perhaps the worst surface they had played on.”
The playing surface was also why the last major soccer event scheduled for Aloha Stadium was canceled.
In December 2015 the U.S. Women’s National Team pulled out of its match scheduled for the next day against Trinidad & Tobago. The team claimed that the artificial turf at Aloha Stadium was unsuited and unsafe for soccer.
After practicing at Aloha Stadium, USWNT players said seams in the turf and pellets they described as sharp rocks made the field dangerous. U.S. Soccer had not inspected the field prior to the team’s arrival, but trusted an appraisal of it by the NFL, which played the Pro Bowl there.
About 15,000 tickets had been distributed for the soccer game, part of the USWNT’s World Cup victory tour. Though all purchasers received refunds, a class-action lawsuit for other expenses (such as fans traveling to Oahu for the match) remains unresolved.
The United States Soccer Federation and the Stadium Authority are listed as defendants. Stadium officials including manager Scott Chan said they have been instructed not to discuss the case. Lawyers from the state Attorney General’s Office said the case is in arbitration, and when cases go to arbitration they are no longer involved.
“Right now the court case is stayed. It’s been about six months (since it went to arbitration),” said Nicholas Kacprowski of Alston Hunt Floyd & Ing, which is representing U.S. Soccer. “There are people claiming travel expenses, people claiming lost wages because they took time off from work — those are probably the biggest categories. The vast majority of ticket sales were to people on Oahu, so I don’t know what they’re going to come up with. … There’s really nothing going on for a while with the case.”
The HTA allotted $200,000 for the USWNT game. But it never sent that money to U.S. Soccer because the contract for the game was never properly executed. HTA is not involved in any litigation having to do with the game, Dance said.
While some say the USWNT players had a legitimate gripe, others say Hawaii and Aloha Stadium got caught in the middle of a clash between the team and U.S. Soccer, because the men’s team nearly always plays on grass rather than artificial surfaces.
“We were used for a bigger issue in the soccer world,” said state Sen. Glenn Wakai, who is chairman of the Senate’s Committee on Economic Development, Tourism and Technology and whose district includes residences bordering Aloha Stadium.
Turf turmoil
The turf was replaced in 2016. Nakamura said he and representatives from all of the four teams playing this week have inspected and approved the field.
“They’re all also happy with the practice fields at the University (of Hawaii), Saint Louis and Radford,” he said. “In 2008 the field was terrible, but Beckham played every single minute without complaint. This field now is much better.”
The Hawaii High School Athletic Association used to hold its state championships at Aloha Stadium, but in recent years the tournaments have been played on the grass fields of the Waipio Peninsula Soccer Complex (in addition to school fields for early rounds).
“Aloha Stadium is a beautiful facility. It’s nothing to do with its quality,” HHSAA spokeswoman Natalie Iwamoto said.
Also, Waipio has multiple fields, allowing for consolation bracket games to be played at the same time at the same location, Iwamoto said.
“It’s nothing to do with turf or grass,” said HHSAA Executive Director Chris Chun, noting that many high school teams play regularly on turf fields.
Another attempt
In 2012, the second try at Nakamura’s dream, he was a consultant and operations manager for ESPN Regional’s Hawaiian Islands Invitational. The soccer at the Hawaiian Islands Invitational was excellent, but the crowds were sparse.
Now as the owner of the company running the event, Nakamura has more control. He is confident there will be a second and a third Pacific Rim Cup.
“We do hope to have people in the seats, but we’re not trying to fill the gap with ticket sales,” said Nakamura, whose supporters include title sponsor Under Armour.
After the USWNT cancellation, Aloha Stadium officials are eager to prove the facility is suitable for soccer.
“It’s always been good for soccer,” Chan said. “It comes down to the client themselves, in terms of what they would prefer. The turf is made in a way in that it accommodates different kinds of activity.
“As a manager, I want to bring in whatever is interesting to the people of the state of Hawaii,” he added. “There’s been an upswing the past few years in youth soccer, and so many of our children play at the next level. And, yes, we want to try and lock in anything we can to a multiyear contract.”
John Fink of the Stadium Authority was 20 in 1976, when he played for a Hawaii all-star team in the opener of the triple-header featuring the New York Cosmos. He counts marching into the stadium with the other athletes, including Pele, as one of the biggest thrills of his life.
He, too, believes in Nakamura.
“The fact that you have two MLS teams and two top J-league teams means the quality will be good and it will continue to grow. People just need to know there’s a commitment to a world-class event,” Fink said. “If you look at (Nakamura’s) background, you see he got Manchester United to come to New York. Other leagues and teams might be available as we go forward.”
But the question remains: Will fans in Hawaii show up en masse for great soccer or just for international celebrities who play great soccer?
ON THE NET:
>> For event and ticket information, go to pacificrimcup.com.
