New York City may have another professional soccer team before it even has a place to play. As speculated, Manchester City of the English Premier League will buy the team, but they'll have a local co-owner: the Yankees. Manchester City's owner, a member of the royal family of Abu Dhabi, will pony up $100 million for the new team, to be called the New York City Football Club, and the Yankees will own a quarter of the club. They'll begin playing in 2015, and if no new stadium is built, they may play the inaugural season in Yankee Stadium. UPDATE: The Yankees announced that they are not tied to building a stadium in Flushing-Meadows Corona Park, where MLS has been looking. Crain's reports that in a conference call, NY Yankees President Randy Levine said, "We're just starting the process here. There are a lot of reasons to be in Queens, but we're going to step back for a second ... This is day one for me and the Yankees, and we're going to take a look and see where's the best place to build. ... We're going to look and see if we'll conclude in Queens or see if there are better places." [NYT; previously]
Filed under:
Loading comments...