2022 Mint City Collective Memberships are now available! Click here to Join Us in 2022!

News

  • Charlotte FC State of Play: Team Analysis

    We’re only ten match weeks into Charlotte FC’s inaugural MLS season and, even for a new club, it’s been a remarkably eventful few months. We’ve seen an attendance record broken, designate player signings arrive and deals collapse, and the establishment of a home fortress balanced with missed opportunities and road struggles. Even if it’s been a weird one at times, it’s certainly the party that David Tepper promised us.

  • Football Radars: Using Charlotte FC's Back Line to Understand What They Mean and How They're Read

    As advanced metrics continue to enter mainstream soccer discussions, countless attempts have been made by data scientists to create easy-to-interpret data visualizations for clubs, players, and fans. Producing figures that tell a story, reveal a pattern, or highlight an outlier to evaluate players in a variety of contexts has become a mainstay of the industry. To understand why let’s start with a simple scatter plot:

  • MCC Analytics: Is Kristijan Kahlina a Top 5 MLS Goalkeeper?

    This is the start of what we hope is a regular contribution to Mint City Collective's ever-growing content that takes a look at advanced metrics, assesses Charlotte FC's performances as a collective unit, and evaluates its players. We'll also use the incredible databases available to the public to explore potential transfers, scout opponents, and trash talk the competition. 

  • MLS Weekly Recap: Week 3

    Three weeks into the 2022 season feels like the right time to start a weekly MLS Recap article, right? Better late than never I suppose. Each week, I’ll take you around the league to keep you up-to-date on everything outside of the Carolinas. I am not going to do a match-by-match breakdown. You can find plenty of those out on the interwebs. Instead, I want to give you my thoughts on the same seven categories each and every week. Without further adieu, I present to you “WEEK 3 IN MLS!”

  • Match Recap: Atlanta United 2-1 Charlotte FC

    It was Adam Armour with the first ever goal in Charlotte FC history, coming at the 66’ to tie the game v Atlanta. In the game where we scored our first MLS goal in club history, it was a 90+6’ goal that saw Atlanta run out as winners in our first derby game against them. A heartbreaking result considering us drawing level earlier in the second half. 

  • Match Recap- MLS Debut in the Capital: DC United 3-0 Charlotte FC

    Charlotte FC began their season in MLS 2022 with a 3-0 defeat to DC United, though a controversial VAR call in the first half defined the early portion of the game. Christian Ortiz found the back of the net, but a controversial offsides call brought the goal back, as we are still waiting for this club’s first ever score in MLS. Had that first half VAR call been overturned, the match might have been different. CLTFC joined the most recent MLS clubs in being the debutants who did not win their first match in the league–LAFC in 2018 were the last MLS expansion team to win their first match in the league.

     

  • MLS Season Predictions 2022 by Chris Ashley

    The Major League Soccer season kicks off this weekend. And even though I predicted FC Cincinnati to make the playoffs in 2021, I am being allowed to try my hand at, once again, predicting the outcomes of the 2022 MLS Season. For each category, I will list my prediction, and to hedge a bit, will also give you who I think will just miss the cut in each category. We will start with the end of season awards and then dive into the team performance categories.

  • Intro to Major League Soccer: The Schedule

    Today is the day! Charlotte FC will play their first publicly accessible game in a preseason friendly as part of the Carolina Challenge Cup down in Charleston. The preseason tournament will see Charlotte FC take the field 3 times in the coming week as a final tune-up to the regular season. If you’re unable to make it down to Charleston for the games, the team will be live streaming them via the CLTFC App and on the team website.

  • Setting the Mood: The Ultimate Display of Choreography of Supporters

    When you go into a stadium to watch the sport of soccer, football, futbol, calcio, you enter to take in two simultaneous experiences. The money you paid for your ticket helps revenue and spending on players, utilities at the stadium, and ultimately the game that is advertised. You see the ebbs and flows, tactics, fouls, goals, and poor(sometimes not so) officiating. But with the aforementioned ebbs and flows comes the second dynamic you experience.

  • Charlotte FC Expansion Draft

    As Charlotte FC’s inaugural season draws near, more and more details regarding the club are coming into focus, and important dates can now be marked in pen on calendars. The club announced on Thursday that the team’s first home match at Bank of America Stadium will be on Saturday, March 5th, 2022, as we host the LA Galaxy in primetime at 8 pm ET. The game will be the team’s second, with the season opener being on the road versus a yet-to-be-named opponent as part of Major League Soccer’s opening weekend on Saturday, February 26th.

  • The Eurosnob’s Guide to MLS

    Are you the type of soccer fan who refers to the game as “football,” “fútbol,” or “The Beautiful Game” unironically but cringe whenever you hear someone talking about “soccer”? Do you wake up earlier on Saturdays and Sundays than during the rest of the week to watch your “local” team in Europe? Do you have the Champions League anthem as your ringtone?

  • It’s the Final Countdown... to the MLS Playoffs!

    Autumn has arrived in Charlotte, which means lovely hiking weather, pumpkin spice everything, and, soon, high-stakes late-season MLS matches! With playoff positioning on the line and the air crisp, this is when the games really start to feel different. More intense.