The new guard is here—and they came to play. San Diego FC‘s first-ever game ended with a shutout win against defending MLS champion LA Galaxy on Sunday, February 23. With the team headed to Snapdragon Stadium for their first home game on March 1, we put together a quick guide to MLS’s 30th franchise. (Spoiler: An Egyptian billionaire, a sovereign nation, and a cadre of businessmen getting together to start pro soccer team may sound like the plot of an HBO show, but it’s SDFC’s real-life origin story.) From the players, coaches, and staff to the club’s newly enhanced venue, here’s everything you need to know about the team.
The Timeline
November 2018
Voters approve SDSU West
Measure G authorizes the sale of the former Qualcomm Stadium site to SDSU. Redevelopment plans include new educational facilities, a mixed-use neighborhood, and a 35,000-seat multipurpose sports venue.
December 2020
Sycuan Band gets into the game
The Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation meets with developer Brad Termini to discuss bringing an MLS team to San Diego. They work with MLS to identify equity partners.
September 2022
Snapdragon Stadium opens its gates
Snapdragon Stadium debuts at the rebranded SDSU Mission Valley campus. Aztecs football, San Diego Wave, and San Diego Legion make it their new home.
October 2022
Mohamed Mansour joins MLS bid
Egyptian billionaire Mohamed Mansour partners with Sycuan to bring top-flight soccer to San Diego. Snapdragon Stadium is identified as the prospective team’s home pitch.
May 2023
MLS awards franchise
San Diego’s $500 million bid edges out Las Vegas to host Major League Soccer’s 30th franchise.
October 2023
SDFC announces brand identity
At a fan rally, SDFC makes it official: San Diego’s colors will be chrome and azul. The 18 lines in the team’s crest represent San Diego County’s 18 incorporated cities.
The Players
San Diego FC signed Hirving “Chucky” Lozano, a Mexican national with a megawatt smile, to be its first and brightest star. That story writes itself, but it also sells the tactics short. Lozano’s pressing ability fits SDFC’s aggressive style of play. The 29-year-old winger, who played most recently for PSV Eindhoven in the Dutch Eredivisie, has over 150 goal contributions across all competitions. All told, Lozano ranks among the best in the world in expected goals, a statistic that calculates the likelihood of a shot being scored. Joining him in attack are veteran winger Emmanuel Boateng and midfielder Luca de la Torre.
“I think this will be a very important club in MLS,” Lozano says. “Everyone involved—from the ownership to Right to Dream to the fans—believes in this project. It’s going to be something special, not just in the league, but worldwide.”
The Coaches
San Diego FC hired Mikey Varas, previously a coach with FC Dallas and the US men’s national team, to do three things: implement the Right to Dream system, develop young players, and win games in the process. “The style of play will be not only a reflection of Right to Dream, but it will also be a reflection of the community of San Diego,” the Bay Area native and fluent Spanish speaker said at his introductory press conference. Assistant coaches Frank Hjortebjerg, Kelvin Jones, and Luciano Fusco and goalkeeper coach Jason Grubb will help him bring that vision to fruition.
See the Full Coaching Staff Here
The Uniform
Soccer jerseys, or “kits,” can be as controversial as politics at Thanksgiving. They can also elicit as much pride as a national flag. Whatever the response to them, San Diego FC’s inaugural kits are historic. The “chrome and azul” ensemble weaves in the club’s identity, including its primary colors. The gradient side stripes “represent the constant flow from one community to another in San Diego,” according to the club—an idea further embodied in the phrase “State of Flow” sewn on the collar. The club’s crest features prominently over the heart, as it will for generations.
The Shot Callers
An American-educated and London-based Egyptian billionaire, a sovereign nation, and a cadre of businessmen start a professional soccer team.
It sounds like the plot of an HBO show, but it happened in San Diego—a supposedly small sports market.
The story starts in 2020, when the Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation, which owns the US Grant Hotel and Sycuan Casino, and developer Brad Termini, now one of the team owners, first discussed bringing an MLS team to San Diego. The region had been trying to attract (and retain) a first-division soccer team since at least the 1960s, when the now-defunct North American Soccer League began play, and San Diego has flirted with MLS since the league’s inception in the ’90s. The Sycuan Band and Termini finally gained traction when they joined forces with Mohamed Mansour.
Mansour’s wealth, derived from a distributing conglomerate, is the foundation of SDFC. He had previously invested in Right to Dream, the youth academy system, and FC Nordsjaelland, a soccer team in Denmark now affiliated with SDFC. The fee to win an MLS franchise had reached a dizzying $500 million. Mansour made it happen.
See the Full Ownership Team Here
If Sycuan and Termini possess the local relationships and knowledge and Mansour provides the infrastructure, then co-owners Tom Penn, Tom Vernon, and Dan Dickinson bring the operational experience. Vernon founded Right to Dream in 1999, and Dickinson now runs the company as its CEO. Penn, a longtime sports executive and San Diego FC’s CEO, helped launch LAFC. (Several other investors, including Padres star Manny Machado, round out the ownership group, and more celebrity investors are coming on board.)
Ownership’s willingness to invest is reflected in the $150 million SDFC Performance Center and Right to Dream Academy in El Cajon. It’s intended to be the engine of a sustainable (and profitable) winning team. The person responsible for turning that boardroom vision into on-the-pitch success is Tyler Heaps, SDFC’s sporting director and general manager.
It’s a fair question whether Heaps’ analytics experience at the US Soccer Federation, AS Monaco, and Right to Dream will translate to success in a management role. At 33 years old, he’s the youngest sporting director in MLS. But his appointment by a global ownership group reflects the growing stature of American soccer and San Diego’s place on the world stage.
The Venue
Opened in September 2022, Mission Valley’s Snapdragon Stadium still has that new-car smell. That didn’t stop San Diego FC from enhancing the 35,000-seat stadium, one of the largest soccer venues in the US.
Among the additions are the innovative “Pitch Box” seats located on the west sideline, adjacent to the San Diego FC and visiting team benches. These are the closest seats to the action, as well as the plushest, and they come with all-inclusive food and beverage, access to the Sycuan Founders Club and Cox Business Club, and complimentary parking.
Diehards can join the San Diego Independent Supporters Union and claim their spot in the Supporter Section. Sections 136 through 140 are “safe standing” areas, which allows attendees to chant, wave flags, and play instruments. Similar to the raucous North End Terrace at rival LAFC’s BMO Stadium, the Supporter Section will be the most distinctive part of an SDFC home game, as it’s one of the few safe standing areas in American sports.
And all fans, no matter where they sit, will have clear sightlines to the pitch and the locally sourced concessions that make Snapdragon Stadium a venue worthy of a MLS team.
The Schedule
