LEADERS
Building on the foundation Nashville SC is growing its youth academy, eyeing the next steps BY MICHAEL GALLAGHER
he most visible evidence of Nashville SC’s growth is rising at The Fairgrounds Nashville in the form of a sporting temple that, with a capacity of 30,000 people, will be the largest soccer-specific stadium in the country. But the club also is growing steadily in other ways in the Middle Tennessee community and in the soccer world more globally. One of those initiatives, its youth system, will likely be as important a contributor to the franchise’s long-term success as an attractive and profitable stadium. Addressing reporters following the 2021 Major League Soccer SuperDraft, Nashville SC General Manager Mike Jacobs spoke in great detail about why the draft was perhaps more important for the young club than it was for any other team in the league. Jacobs has had to construct a team from the ground up in a region that hasn’t produced much MLS talent — as part of MLS, Nashville SC has territorial rights to all youth players living in Tennessee. And he is having to do it without a developmental team, or a “B” team as he calls it, which places more emphasis on the development and funneling of talent through the club’s youth academy. “When you look at other territories in MLS, the state of Tennessee is one of, if not the least populated territories of players who have matriculated into MLS,” Jacobs says. “So the challenge we have is to take this territory that traditionally has not had a lot of players who have grown into MLS prospects and be able to turn that around.”
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Mike Jacobs
ERIC ENGLAND
