Goals US, owned by City Football Group, has merged with Sofive, creating a bi-coastal recreational soccer business with some of the world’s finest and most technologically advanced facilities.
Sofive is pioneer of the 5-a-side soccer market in the US. Founded in 2015, it has a footprint of five sites in the Northeast.
City Football Group announced its investment in a joint venture in Goals US in July 2017 before going on to acquire the entire business last year.
Since the initial investment, Goals US has grown from two sites to four in southern California, which will now link up with Sofive’s five sites to create one of the US’ leading recreational soccer brands.
Sofive will assume operational control of the newly combined company. Both the Goals and Sofive brands will continue to operate for the time being.
The ambition is for the business to continue to grow and develop, particularly in the lead up to the 2026 FIFA World Cup, which is likely to encourage even greater participation in recreational and grassroots soccer.
To mark the announcement and Manchester City’s first ever UEFA Champions League final, all nine sites will be providing free pick-up soccer games on the day of the final ahead of the big match with exclusive prizes and giveaways on offer.
Established in May 2013, City Football Group is the world’s leading private owner and operator of football clubs, with total or partial ownership of 10 clubs in major cities across the world: newly crowned Premier League Champions Manchester City in the UK, New York City FC in the U.S., Melbourne City FC in Australia, Yokohama F. Marinos in Japan, Montevideo City Torque in Uruguay, Girona FC in Spain, Sichuan Jiuniu FC in China, ISL Champions Mumbai City FC in India, Lommel SK in Belgium, ESTAC Troyes in France and Partner Club Bolivar in Bolivia. With offices around the world, CFG also invests in other football related businesses and projects and serves as a global commercial platform for its partners, whilst fulfilling its vision of using football for social good on a local and global scale through its clubs’ charities, foundations and other CSR initiatives.
This merger represents an even deeper commitment to North America for City Football Group, which is already extremely active. Alongside its ownership of Major League Soccer’s New York City FC, it is an anchor partner in sports tech fund, Sapphire Sport and has pitches and active community programmes in New York, Washington D.C., Chicago and Los Angeles. In November 2019, Silver Lake, a global leader in technology investing, became a minority shareholder in the Group, valuing it at $4.8bn.
Don Dransfield, Chief Strategy Officer, City Football Group said:
“The Goals US merger with Sofive is an extremely exciting development for recreational soccer in the US. We have long had the ambition to extend our footprint and Sofive was the perfect partner, with its outstanding management team and technologically advanced facilities. We can now share our learning, resources and technology to enhance all of our sites. This also reflects our continued commitment to the sport of soccer in the US. It continues to have an incredibly bright future and we are proud to be a part of that both at a professional and grassroots level.”
Charles Lagayette, Chief Executive Officer, Sofive said:
“We are incredibly proud to be backed by City Football Group, a company that not only is a global leader in soccer, but embraces our core values. This new, bi-coastal, business will host over a million players every year across nine sites with plenty of scope to continue to grow. This is a transformational agreement for the company to strengthen the business, and to grow and bring our concept to even more communities across the US. It’s what we set out to do when we opened our first Sofive in New Jersey six years ago, and we could not be more excited for the company’s future.”