I suppose the dream of a MLS club in Ottawa is over, for now at least. Ottawa Sports and Entertainment Group (OSEG), along with their partner Ottawa Fury owner and CEO John Pugh, announced today they have applied for a United Soccer Leagues First Division (USL-1) franchise.

The team would play and be based at a proposed new stadium at Lansdowne Park.

“Our application for a USL franchise, at this point in time, ensures that soccer specific elements will be incorporated into the stadium design to optimize the experience for soccer fans and players,” said Jeff Hunt, an OSEG partner. “And I can tell you, the fan experience for USL-1 soccer is top-notch. The caliber of play, the quality of the stadia and the involvement of the players in community activities is second to none. It is a tremendous environment for soccer purists, casual fans and families seeking an affordable, fun outing.”

I’m curious to see how this new team fits into this on-going situation between the new owners of the USL and the current team owners. Its a sticky mess right now with that league but it does look good that they are adding teams for next year.

Ottawa will join the Tampa Bay Rowdies and FC New York as new clubs in the league.

I’ve read a few good articles today that I thought were worth sharing all at once.

Weighted Lottery System In Question

First up is Kyle McCarthy’s Musings for the day. His big point is about the league’s weighted lottery system and how it needs to go. Honestly I couldn’t agree with his main points any more.

This all stems from last week’s lottery winner RSL who had a 5% chance to win U.S. U-20 captain and former Southampton defender  Kyle Davis. While the club won this lottery fair and square it does seem like it is time to do away with a system that isn’t all that good to begin with.

I think McCarthy hit this one on the head saying that if the player in question is allocation worthy let them go through that process (though even that needs an update to a degree). If the player doesn’t worthy an allocation he should just go through a normal waiver process.

Philly Coaching Search

Funny that the club that will come to be next year is already searching for a coach before it has a name or even team colors. Saying that though the club hasn’t officially said they are looking for a coach just yet here, it’s just a writer in that area putting put a list of coaches that could be a good fit.

Mark Chajkowsky wrote for the Examiner.com about the possibly list of coaches for the Philly club. Chajkowsky made some good points that the club needs to find a guy like Bob Bradley type of coach, one that leads the club to a rare MLS Cup visit in their first year and not the extreme opposite in RSL’s old coach John Ellinger.

The list gives some usual suspects but a couple names pop out to me that I think could be good fits in the end. Dave Sarachan is the top choice here on the list. For one I totally agree with though I think his current boss Bruce Arena could also be under consideration for this position in Philly (espeically if things continue to go sour in LA this season).

Arena going to an expansion team just makes sense at this point to me. Though Sarachan would also make a great candidate.

Two other names worth looking into. The usual coaching candidate Paul Mariner from New England and Mike Sorber, the current second-in-command to Bob Bradley with the National team.

I honestly love the idea of Sorber for this position if he’d take it.

Ottawa Likely Out

It is not looking good up in Ottawa for when it comes to getting a MLS club. Some would say their hopes were already dead a month ago but now it appears things are going cold. Apparently the CFL group won the cities vote over Eugene Melynk and his MLS effort.

Melynk doesn’t appear to want to work with the CFL group so the MLS bid has taken a definite turn for the worst.

I agree with others out there that hope this means Montreal will get back into the fold here.

Carver Fined

That didn’t take long. A few weeks in and John Carver has been fined by the league for his comments regarding Tim Weyland after a 3-2 loss to FC Dallas on Sunday on a penalty in the 84th minute.

Well he was commenting on one of the worst refs so far this year in Weyland. I kind of don’t blame him for it.

Those in Canada (and maybe here in the US for all I know) hoping to see another weird location in MLS might have to pick a new location to follow as the Ottawa expansion bid may have been given the death sentence yesterday.

According to the Ottawa Sun, Ottawa city staff’s evaluation of two major stadium proposals favors Lansdowne Live over the potential bid by Ottawa Senators owner Eugene Melnyk.

The city deems Melnyk’s business plan “below expectations.”

The report says Senators Sports and Entertainment “was deemed not to have satisfied this criteria (business plan).”

It says that the revenues expected from their plan were too optimistic.

A tough blow to this bid indeed. It doesn’t mean it is totally dead but it sounds like it isn’t far off from being the case. Its not like any of us really expected this to be a MLS city in the end anyways.

Editor’s note: This is the second column but Geoff Reid. As mentioned before Geoff will be writing on WVH from time to time. Today he tackles the fun that has been the 2011 expansion race.

With the 2009 MLS season about to kick off this week and everything that’s happened the week gone by, I thought it would be appropriate to discuss the future regarding our league.

Last week we saw drama from the Pacific northwest to the Gateway City. The fact that the vote in Portland on Wednesday would not only dictate how far their own bid would go, it would also influence the Ottawa bid and especially the St. Louis bid. However, even before all this 11th hour drama began, what looks like the one certain lock has been the quiet, yet steady bid the whole time since all original bids were announced back in the fall. Continue Reading…

We started with seven and now with a couple weeks left before the league’s decision on expansion we have four cities in the running. With today’s news about Miami getting dropped from consideration one has to wonder which of the final four will the league go with?

For weeks I had said that since the league didn’t go a head and grant Miami a bid like most had thought they would before today that something was going wrong. A few months back most expected Miami to already be planning for 2010. But instead there was a delay and that delay ended today as bid died.

Sorry Miami fans, it just wasn’t in the cards for you after all. And to be real honest it is a smart move on the league’s part to not try that market just yet here. One day down the road for sure but definitely not now.

I liked the passion some people had about the Miami bid. Believe me there were plenty of commentors on here about how Miami would get a club in 2010 and that good news was around the corner for the bid. Turns out their wishful thinking was just that.

Today all we will see is a flood of Miami bashers out there and a slew of Miami fans that will just be upset more than anything.

In the end we have four left on the floor to pick from. Portland, a strong bid that is close to getting the public support that it needs to get a bid; Vancouver, a well-backed bid in a city that would probably handle a MLS team pretty well; St. Louis, once seen as a front-runner is now probably more of a dark horse than anything today; and Ottawa, the most laughed at bid in the bunch.

I am still hopeful that St. Louis can get it done in the end but money has and will probably continue to be an issue with them.

My money today, just like it has been for the last several months is on Portland for one bid and now more than ever I believe Vancouver is the other. We will see in a couple short weeks.

Where do you see the league going to now? Miami, the bid seen as a front-runner for months is gone…so who is now in line to take the bids?

Weirder things have happened before.

The Ottawa Sun is reporting that MLS commissioner Don Garber practically assured Ottawa  an expansion team if the ownership group gets a go-ahead from the city council to build a proposed $110 million soccer stadium.

“It’s highly unlikely and almost inconceivable that with a stadium deal in place we would not grant an expansion team to Ottawa,” Garber told the Sun.

I still don’t see it happening. Too many pieces have to fall in place for this bid to get the nod. Not to mention the amount of backlash it will create if it does go through. I won’t lie, it would be a dumb thing for MLS to go to Ottawa right now. Its nothing against the city or the area (which is beautiful by the way), it just won’t work for the league in my opinion right now.

Ottawa got it’s chance to shine for Major League Soccer today.

Ottawa Senators owner Eugene Melnyk met with league brass today to attempt to sway the league’s decision to the Canadian capital. He laid on a series of meetings for MLS commissioner Don Garber and president Mark Abbott with all three levels of Canadian government.

Ottawa is the final expansion candidate to be visited by Garber and Abbott as they attempt to choose two cities to be awarded the two MLS expansion bids in 2011. St. Louis, Portland, Vancouver and Miami are the other four remaining candidates.

MLS is expected to choose the winning bids by mid-March.

Garber’s only comment on the Ottawa situation was not a bad one but not a great one either.

“The only drawback at present is that there is no stadium.”

Take that for what you will. Ottawa is still a big long-shot in this race but definitely a dark horse in some minds out there. Could they really sneak in and get one of the two spots? I still doubt it but its a never say never kind of thing. I was always shocked to see Salt Lake in the league and that seemed to work out alright for everyone. Maybe Ottawa would be more like that.