Jacksonville Tea Men

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Jacksonville Tea Men was a professional football club in Jacksonville , Florida , both outdoor and indoor - soccer practice. It was established in 1980 as the successor to the New England Tea Men founded in Foxborough , Massachusetts in 1978 .

history

Participation in the NASL (1981–1982)

After the Lipton Tea Company heard the positive expectations of the authorities in Jacksonville due to the decline in viewers in Massachusetts of their club playing in the NASL , which were supposedly convinced that they could sell around 14,000 season tickets, the move to Florida was completed. However, the reality was different and the club achieved an average of less than 4,500 in its first season in 1981 at the new location.

After the 1981 outdoor season, Lipton reported a $ 7 million loss from the club since its inception in early 1978. Nevertheless, Lipton invested another $ 150,000 to enable participation in the 1981/82 indoor winter season. There the team was able to look forward to an average of 6,375 spectators who flocked to the Jacksonville Coliseum for each home game .

After the subsequent outdoor season in 1982 turned into a fiasco (the team ended up in last place and accordingly the audience interest fell out), Lipton had finally lost interest in the club, which was about to end less than five years after it was founded.

The last two years (1983–1984)

In early 1983, Jacksonville-based businessman Ingo Krieg took over the club and registered it in the "second class" ASL . The club's name was retained, although the withdrawal from Lipton had lost all reference to the tea trade.

At the end of the 1983 season, the Jacksonville Tea Men won the ASL championship and were allowed to participate in the CONCACAF Champions' Cup in 1984 . There the team could have played against the Mexican top club Chivas Guadalajara if the club had not withdrawn from the tournament in which they did not play a single game beforehand.

It didn't go any better at the national level either. After Krieg had withdrawn his team from the ASL at the end of 1983 and had been instrumental in founding the USL , the team experienced another sporting failure and did not even qualify for the play-offs. After the disappointing 1984 season, war had also lost interest in the club and dissolved it.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The CONCACAF Champions' Cup 1984 at RSSSF

Web links