As Hurricane Florence bears down on the Carolinas, the NWSL semifinal between the North Carolina Courage and Chicago Red Stars scheduled for Sunday at 2pm CT is “in doubt”.
The league released a statement that in part states the following:
“The league and teams continue to explore all options and scenarios that would ultimately permit the match to be played in front of the NC Courage home fans.
The safety of the fans, players and staff, as well as the ability for the Red Stars to travel to North Carolina safely, remains the top priority for NWSL. An announcement as to the status of the match will be made as soon as reasonably possible.”
The Red Stars told our Rusty Silber that they offered to hold the match at Toyota Park, but there are “no real plans” to move the game there at this point.
Red Stars head coach was quoted as saying he would not compel his team to fly to Cary, North Carolina in with a hurricane looming per a tweet from Jonathan Tannenwald.
“I’m not going to mandate that somebody step on a plane and fly into something they aren’t comfortable with,” said Dames.
As of 8:30pm CT, no plans have been made on the match. Portland hosts Seattle in the other semifinal on Saturday with the Championship Game in Portland on September 22nd (1:30pm CT, Lifetime).
It is not the first time a hurricane has disrupted a Chicago soccer team’s plans. The Fire were supposed to play the 1998 US Open Cup Final against Columbus in Virginia Beach in August, but was postponed due to Hurricane Bonnie. The Final was rescheduled for October 30th at Soldier Field where the Fire defeated the Crew, 2-1, on a golden goal from Frank Klopas.
