MLS: Stadium isn't end-all for league

Both Minnesota groups vying for a Major League Soccer expansion franchise can be encouraged by the varying examples of stadiums, or stadium plans, the league has been willing to work with in its expansion drive.

The Vikings can reference Atlanta's new club, which will play its inaugural 2017 season in a new stadium to be shared with the NFL's Falcons.

Minnesota United FC can look to a once fellow lower-division club in Orlando City SC, which will move to MLS for the 2015 season and will play in the Citrus Bowl stadium until its new soccer-centric home is ready in 2016.

These divergent, yet both agreeable, examples mean the Vikings and United remain viable options to land an expansion franchise despite their own drastically different stadium situations.

The Vikings, United and a groups from Sacramento, Calif., and Las Vegas presented their cases to the league's leadership in November. The four groups await a decision on the league awarding an expansion franchise in the first half of 2015.

"If Minnesota is getting it, which I believe it is, stadiums are first and foremost," said ESPN soccer commentator Taylor Twellman. "There are no ideas of stadiums. There's no this or that. You need to have a stadium approved, and it needs to be ready to rock for a market like this to work, and it needs to be downtown and next to public transit."

The Vikings have a concrete plan. A $1 billion, indoor stadium in downtown Minneapolis is being built and would be ready for soccer in 2017.

United has nascent plans to build a new stadium. The Loons play their North American Soccer League matches at the National Sports Center in Blaine, and one possible plan is an 18,000-seat, natural-grass, outdoor stadium adjacent to Target Field in downtown Minneapolis.

United has not disclosed whether they would seek public financing to help pay for a new stadium. Land acquisition is not considered to be a problem.

Minneapolis City Council President Barb Johnson previously told the Pioneer Press she didn't believe there would be a civic interest in committing public monies to another stadium.

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MLS: Stadium isn't end-all for league