Nashville Metros

The new Metros started up kind of abruptly. A businessman who graduated from Vanderbilt was captivated by the 2018 US World Cup team thought he could bring a team to the city. Doing some research, he found out about the Nashville Metros. The team started play in 1989, but folded in 2012. Nashville has hosted US games, so there is a soccer culture. But they haven’t had anyone to run them like a franchise. He contacted the AO club in the city, and selected members to help him out. The team landed a USL team to start play in 2020. With the AAA baseball team Nashville Sounds moving to a new downtown stadium in 2015, the owner looked into the status of Greer Stadium. The old stadium was only holding high school baseball games very rarely. He talked to the owners and got the OK to play the Metros home games there. They got the rights to the Metros name, but would use black and gold as the colors as an ode to his alma mater.

The inaugural team was made up of USL free agents, and college players from around the state. Obviously, they didn’t do too well on the field. But the team was showing more support than the team had ever gotten pre-folding. They averaged 6,000 fans a game their first year, which was something to improve upon. In the off season, they did some minor renovations to the stadium, and famous guitar-shaped scoreboard. The team went out and picked up an aging MLS veteran from the city to help out at midfield. As an attempt to score more goals, they picked up a player from Iceland that had played one year in the NASL before getting cut. The Metros showed more life on the field and finished a few games under .500. They fired their manager, and picked up a coach from the NPSL as a way to bring the team together. An intense rivalry was formed with Chattanooga. The Metros fans showed up big and loud to Chattanooga and helped the Metros steal some wins. In 2024, the Memphis Rogues began playing. The three teams started to play for the Volunteer State Cup. All playing in the USL, the Metros were win the first trophy. They never were that great in league play. The team hasn’t had a true soccer professional in the front office, just a rich owner listening to fans. Only recently they started constructing a youth facility for the future of the Metros, but Nashville has a lot of soccer talent, so they have had some players get into the system, and make the front office optimistic. They go into 2030 with some new toys. They picked up a player from Uganda to put in at Defense, then they added a former MLS all-star at attack. They are predicted to finish around mid-table in 2030, but anything is possible.

The crest shape is taken from Stoke. I wanted something very basic. Just gold and black with a star. I thought music themed had already been done by teams in the city, so this is just a conservative concept. I thought white/gold/white was a pretty good home look. I thought about doing yellow and navy, but then all the teams in Tennessee would have some sort of blue, so I decided against it.