Moving up: Cincinnati latest team added in MLS expansion
CINCINNATI (AP) — No longer just a pro baseball or football city. Not just a hotbed for college hoops. Thousands of soccer fans held a pep rally to celebrate Cincinnati's surprising ascendance on the pitch.
It's now a soccer city, too.
Major League Soccer added Cincinnati in its latest round of expansion Tuesday, rewarding a city that set attendance records during three seasons of United Soccer League play and has a stadium deal in place.
"You have shocked the world," MLS Commissioner Don Garber told hundreds of blue-and-orange clad fans at a brewery north of downtown.
The announcement brings MLS to 26 teams, two shy of its ultimate goal. It began as a 10-team league in 1996.