Timbers tidbits for Tuesday

Attract nearly 16k fans to a minor league soccer game in the USA and people take notice . . .

Pitchinvasion – 15,833:

If the rest of the world thinks Major League Soccer is a Mickey Mouse league, what would they make of the level below that, the United Soccer Leagues First Division? Well, if they saw the crowd from the Portland Timbers final regular season home game of their USL season, they might think it’s a level above MLS. OK, maybe that’s stretching it, but 15,833 is a mighty impressive number

The Offside Rules – Portland Packs PGE Park:

Rose City had over 15K+ souls in attendance last night for their last home game of the season (vs. Charleston Battery). And this is after gone without a win in the last seven matches. Folks, that is true passion. That is true support. Those are true fans.

UPDATE – and yet another:

Dave’s Football Blog: Is Portland Making a Case for an MLS Club?:

That’s a huge turnout for a USL-1 match. This is a league which had an average attendance of 4,667 for regular season games last year. Wigan can’t get 15,000 paying customers on a weeknight.

Holy shit, Timbers even get love from the crafty-blog world:

Blue garter – When I root, I root for the Timbers:

They call themselves the Timbers Army, and stadium management graciously allows them to bring in enormous flags on eight-foot poles, drums, trumpets, cowbells, inflatable dolphins, streamers, and green smoke bombs. They never sit down during the match, and neither do they shut up. For the 90 minutes of the game, plus the warm-up, half time, and a good fifteen minutes after the victory, they were in constant song, chant, and heckle.

And let’s not forget the previously mentioned . . .

a pretty move – 15,833!:

. . . and the drought finally ended in the 81st minute, thanks to Justin Thompson. The crowd went wild! The flag was unfurled again at last! Owner Merritt Paulson came racing down the steps between 106 and 107, and racing back up, high-fived fans all the way! Timbers-colored smoke rose into the air! I was baptized in someone’s beer! And then at some point UP keeper/TA capo Dan went aloft, passed up through the crowd!

Center Holds It – Portland Timbers’ Record Night: An Anthropological Study:

. . . last night’s crowd was young – as in “young adult” – hip and, to be blunt about it, pretty damn hot. We’re talking young people dressed tight and trendy. To take a bit of a cheap shot (but, hey, I’ve earned it), of all the adjectives in the world, “hip,” “pretty damn hot,” and “trendy” very rarely apply in these United States. Based on first-hand experience with crowds in numerous professional soccer towns, soccer simply isn’t what the beautiful people do.