Asheville, North Carolina is getting a new semi-professional soccer team in 2017. Asheville City Soccer Club will be competing in the National Premier Soccer League, and I got the opportunity to speak with Ryan Kelley, the president of the club to learn more about them.

So what made you guys decide to start a soccer team in Asheville?

Well, the short story is… I read an article last May about Dennis Crowley starting up an NPSL team in upstate New York (Kingston Stockade FC), and I’ve been a fan of soccer for years and couldn’t believe we didn’t have a team like that here yet. Our ownership group is all local, and we looked at similar NPSL teams to look at things we could do to start a team in Asheville.

What has the community reaction/involvement been?

Well, we already consider ourselves a soccer town. We are partnering with excellent local youth and adult associations, not in a competitive way, but in a cooperative way to help grow the game in our area. We are open to working with all local soccer organizations.

Do you guys have a supporters group yet?

Yes, pretty much right when we announced our launch an independent supporters group called the South Slope Blues started up. They named themselves after the area we are playing in which is called South Slope. We have a great relationship with them and are working on getting a supporters section for them at our Memorial Stadium.

I can dig any supporter’s group that uses His Dudeness in a tweet.

So what is your stadium situation?

We play at Memorial Stadium, which is owned by the city. The stadium will be getting some renovations since the city passed a bond referendum last November. Our stadium location is perfect for us. Right in the downtown area, we are walking distance from nine breweries including our main sponsor Hi-Wire. I don’t believe any other club in the country has that kind of a location.

One thing I love that you guys are doing is that your season ticket is actually your home jersey. Where did you get the idea?

Chattanooga does it as well. Yea, we would love to claim that idea, but we got it from them. A really cool thing happened where right after we announced it a lot of people talked about it on soccer Reddit. A couple days later some staff from Lyon reached out to ask us about it.

What would you consider a successful season, both on and off the field?

On the field we want to make the playoffs. It’s a bit ambitious but we are here to win. Coach Gary Hamel has put together a good team, and that’s what our goal is.

Off the field, we want to paint this city blue. We want to unify the soccer community in Asheville. We are aiming to build a culture of support and winning. We want to be more than just a place to have a beer. We want people to be into the games, and care about the outcome. We want them to get involved and know things like if we win this game, it gets us into the playoffs.

So what does Asheville City have to do to compete in the US Open Cup?

Qualifications change from year to year depending on how many spots are available. Usually winning our conference tournament would be the best way to guarantee competing in the cup. Depending on the spots there may be some “at large” spots where you may not have won the conference but you had a lot of points, goal difference, things like that.

The US Open Cup is very important to us. I personally would like to see more of the smaller teams allowed into the tournament, because it means so much to us. Meanwhile, you have some of the top clubs not even caring about the tournament. A lot of US soccer fans aren’t even aware of the tournament because it’s not made as much of a big deal by some of the bigger teams.

Why did the team join the NPSL as opposed to the PDL?

We like the member-driven structure of the NPSL. They allow us to be our own club. We can choose whether we want to be a developmental club or more competitive. NPSL doesn’t have a U-23 structure which we liked so we wouldn’t alienate local talent who are above that age.

Anything else you’d like people to know?

March 30th at 6pm we have our launch party, where people can pick up jerseys, get to know staff, coaches, and players. It is at Hi-Wire’s big top.