by Jamie Trecker

Updated: February 14, 2008, 12:59 PM EST 23 comments

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Mexico's national team draws better and makes far more money than the USA's own national team, pulling an average of 21,000 more fans per game head-to-head. Mexico's games made an estimated $18 million a year more at American gates than U.S. national team games, making the USA's own product a second-class citizen in its own country.

Embarrassing? Try obvious — Mexican fans are the most visible face of an emerging new American soccer culture that is poised to upset the upper-middle class, white-dominated sport which replaced the ethnic variety that flourished from the 'Roaring Twenties' through the early days of the NASL.

And all this would make for a fascinating discussion, except for one thing ...

The next day, the real two-ton gorilla showed up and knocked on America's door.

The English Premier League's announcement last week that it will seek to expand its footprint abroad is a shot across world soccer's bow. It could mean untold riches for the increasingly cosmopolitan Premier League clubs. It could also spell trouble for other, smaller leagues around the planet, including the FMF and MLS.

Let's start where the PL is with the money. Just how much are these games worth? An industry source, who has staged both major American sporting events and international soccer matches in America, estimated conservatively that the gate alone for one match in the USA could gross $9 million, with another $500,000 from merchandise sales.

The source added that at a typical American venue, which he described as seating "66,000 people", a match could bring in as much as $5 million net at the gate alone. This calculation didn't even factor in luxury suite tickets or the emerging secondary market.

In other words, ONE Premier League game would bring in as much at the U.S. gate as the Mexican national team does in SIX outings (if you're a real glutton for punishment, think of this — one PL game gate could be expressed as a factor of an entire U.S. Women's national team season).

These are sobering thoughts.

MLS has reacted with cautious support for the plan, sensing that English teams and their enormous fan base could together help them do what they have not yet done on their own — make soccer a big-time, mainstream sport in the USA.

That's a heady gamble, for not many fans of the Premier League (though not all, to be sure) cross over to watch MLS games. But some MLS GMs, smarting in the face of the fact that they are unable to fill their new soccer-specific stadiums, see dollar signs and are willing to hope. What other soccer game in America could command $500 tickets?

Intriguingly, the reaction to the Premier League's plan has been universally negative from the English press, who see it as nothing more than unfettered greed. What's comical — even if this lock-step reaction was predictable — is that greed got the Premier League to where it is today.

Greed caused the formation of the Premiership in the first place, back in 1992, when teams got sick of poor TV deals and the doddery FA telling them what they could or couldn't do. And the press — who are notorious for their economic jealousy — hypocritically always want it both ways. They demand the best from the teams and the players, yet stoke the fans into hysteria over what they perceive to be excessive club bids for more revenue.

The thing many English fans fail to grasp is that they are no longer the sole supporters of their clubs. England sees itself as the guardian of a game that is actually the world's greatest success story. Liverpool, Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal, Everton — all enjoy fervent support in Asia and America and this year, more TV money was generated outside England from PL matches than it was in the league's own country.

According to the Premier League itself, an estimated one billion people tuned in last November to watch Arsenal and Manchester United face off, and it wouldn't be a surprise if another billion had tuned in to watch this past Sunday's doubleheader featuring Manchester United, Manchester City, Chelsea and Liverpool.

While the NFL is trying to gain support for its teams and its game abroad, the PL already has that support. Now, it must service those fans too, and the truth is that Premier League head Richard Scudamore is right when he says that if the Premier League doesn't expand abroad, someone else will.

The PL has a five-year lead right now, thanks in part to Italy's disorganization and Spain's failure to market itself beyond Real Madrid and Barcelona. And all this demands revenue, and new markets.

So, the PL's desire to play outside of England isn't just about money. It's about taking the game to the fans, wherever they are.

There is surely another move afoot, as yet unspoken. What good is it to introduce clubs like Fulham, Derby County and Wigan to fans abroad if they are going to disappear from the Premiership due to relegation? Fans may not like it, but the PL is also edging towards an NFL-style "fixed" league, one that separates the haves from the have-nots decisively and forever.

This may mean expansion as well — a two-conference, 28-team league might fall afoul of FIFA's wishes, but it would allow the PL to blanket the UK to the exclusion of all else.

When this move comes — and it will — it will be blamed on the new American owners, who are presumed to have bought into the PL solely as an investment vehicle.

This overlooks the ruinous costs of relegation in an era of high-cost stadiums, big-money contracts and voracious TV demands. Relegation and promotion is a cherished part of the world game. It is also an antique, and sooner or later, if the PL is truly to become a 'world league', it will be consigned to history.

This is a real quandary. Without those small clubs, you don't get player development. And yet, as we've seen across Europe and here in the States, these small clubs frequently run at a loss, and cling onto existence with a combination of financial legerdemain and stubbornness.

Yet, as we've seen in Holland, Belgium and Italy, unless these clubs have some hope of selling their players or getting a shot at the big time, finding funding is nigh impossible.

The funny thing is, while England's fans and press decry expansion, it might be the only thing that saves the small clubs. More TV revenue would mean more partnerships between clubs, big and small. It would mean more tax money for governments to prop up the Serie C's of the world. It would also mean a real farm system, but with that, a chance to preserve the Nottingham Forests of the world.

It will be interesting to see if the PL is bold enough to tell that truth. It's clear that, like it or not, these games are going to happen. FIFA won't stop it as long as they get their cut, and the FA would just be ignored if it tried to horn in. If one country objects to the PL coming in and staging games, they'll just find another — at last count, some 200 cities are expected to field proposals.

So, convincing the home fans and that voracious British media that the additional profits from games outside England might be the only way to keep the struggling have-nots alive would be a smart way to sell their latest idea. It would be marketing, for sure. It would be branding, and it would be rich.

It also might be true.

Jamie Trecker's newest book, "Love and Blood: At the World Cup with the Footballers, Fans and Freaks" is out now from Harcourt. Jamie is assisted by Jerry and Janice Trecker. Contact Jamie at jamie.trecker@gmail.com and visit his blog and website at www.jamietrecker.com.

The views and opinions expressed by Jamie Trecker do not necessarily reflect those of the Fox Soccer Channel or FoxSoccer.com.