Miami's out

MLS won't return to Miami after all.

The statement from MLS:

"Major League Soccer, FC Barcelona, and Marcelo Claure have jointly agreed that Miami is no longer a candidate to be one of the next two MLS expansion teams. After extensive discussions and collaborative evaluation a decision was made that at this time because it was determined that it was not feasible to launch a Major League Soccer team in South Florida in 2010 due to adverse market conditions.

Notwithstanding, FC Barcelona remains committed to Major League Soccer and the U.S. market and will continue to work with MLS and Marcelo Claure on other soccer-related projects."

This isn't completely surprising as a report broke a week ago from Spain in which Barca folks were second-guessing the move into MLS.

Let's see now, we've got Miami and Atlante and Montreal out of the running, so the next two expansion teams will come from: Vancouver, St. Louis, Ottawa and Portland as the remaining cities.

I wonder if more of these remaining bids will falter due to the economy. With so many jobs going by the wayside and money become increasingly tight throughout the country, I wonder if these bids will have enough funds and support behind them to expand. It's not cheap to expand into MLS after all.