{"id":130941,"date":"2026-01-13T01:05:06","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T01:05:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/130941\/"},"modified":"2026-01-13T01:05:06","modified_gmt":"2026-01-13T01:05:06","slug":"professional-soccer-could-return-to-fresno-under-new-usl-agreement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/130941\/","title":{"rendered":"Professional soccer could return to Fresno under new USL agreement"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<img width=\"1140\" height=\"470\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Cws7Wt8UcAQqygX-1.jpg\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"soccer team\" decoding=\"async\" fetchpriority=\"high\"  \/>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p class=\"attach_desc\">Members of the Fresno Football Club wear jerseys featuring the El Mexicano. Image via Fresno Fuego<\/p>\n<p>Professional soccer may once again be returning to Fresno after a brief hiatus. <\/p>\n<p>The City of Fresno announced Monday a new agreement between Fresno and the United Soccer League (USL).<\/p>\n<p>Mayor Jerry Dyer will hold a news conference Tuesday morning at city hall announcing the exclusive deal with USL and how it could help Dyer\u2019s long-time goal of bringing life back to Downtown Fresno.<\/p>\n<p>Professional soccer has had an up-and-down history with Fresno, with many of the issues coming from the lack of a soccer-specific stadium over the years. Many of the teams played their games at Chukchansi Park.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Fresno last hosted a professional soccer team from 2022-2024 with Central Valley Fuego FC, who played its matches at Fresno State. Prior to Fuego FC, Fresno had the Fresno Fuego and Fresno FC.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In recent years, Fuego ownership has continued to look at soccer stadium options. While the media advisory from the City of Fresno states how if soccer were to come to Fresno \u201chow it could support ongoing revitalization efforts in Downtown Fresno,\u201d there have been rumblings of a stadium outside of downtown.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>According to an April 2025 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fresnobee.com\/news\/local\/article304191636.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Fresno Bee<\/a> article, one of the proposals would have put a privately developed soccer-specific stadium on a portion of the 15-acre Blackbeard\u2019s Family Entertainment Center property near the airport.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Blackbeard\u2019s owner and Fuego managing partner Juan Gerardo Ruelas Jr told the Fresno Bee that the preliminary plans for the stadium would include a 4,000-seat venue with the ability to expand to 15,000 seats. The stadium would be used as a multipurpose facility that would be able host additional sporting events.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Ruelas has said the stadium would serve as home for the Fuego\u2019s men\u2019s and women\u2019s teams and could also be used by other soccer programs throughout the Valley. Fuego announced in November 2024 that it will not field a men\u2019s professional USL team in 2025 and will instead compete in the amateur League For Clubs during an organizational restructuring.<\/p>\n<p>The media advisory does not mention if a potential team would be the Fuego.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>While the City of Fresno has promoted downtown stadium concepts as tools for economic revitalization, however such projects have drawn scrutiny nationally.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>A <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/11\/10\/realestate\/soccer-specific-stadium-pawtucket.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">New York Times<\/a> review this past November showed examples of soccer-specific stadium developments that found that mixed-use projects tied to stadiums are often delayed or only partially completed, raising questions about their long-term economic impact.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Additional details will be available following Dyer\u2019s news conference.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Members of the Fresno Football Club wear jerseys featuring the El Mexicano. Image via Fresno Fuego Professional soccer&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":130942,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[112,114,113],"class_list":{"0":"post-130941","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fresno","8":"tag-fresno","9":"tag-fresno-headlines","10":"tag-fresno-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130941","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=130941"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130941\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/130942"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=130941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=130941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=130941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}