At a World Cup-themed event for toddlers held at a suburban Kansas City library — roughly 20 miles from the stadium hosting six tournament matches — little Jude Cornell was among a group of tiny children chasing soccer balls, flinging training cones, and dragging a very moveable goalie net around the room.
“He just started walking,” his mother, 27-year-old Kyra Cornell, said with a laugh. She’s already daydreaming about her son’s future in the sport.
Scenes like this are playing out as experts across the country keep a close eye on whether the World Cup will give youth soccer a meaningful boost — and create fans who will follow the game for generations.
Soccer already holds a strong position among youth sports in America. According to a report from the Aspen Institute, 7.5% of children between ages 6 and 12 played youth soccer in 2024. That figure represents a slight decline from a decade ago, but only baseball and basketball posted higher participation numbers.
Eighteen-year-old Haley Garbowski offers a glimpse of what that youth participation can produce. A midfielder who has lost count of how many professional women’s soccer matches she’s attended, Garbowski was volunteering at a summer sports camp on the Kansas side of the Kansas City metro area just days after her private Missouri high school claimed a state championship title.
“We were killing it,” she said, reflecting on the victory in the small school division. This fall, she heads to San Diego State University to study business, with an eye toward a career in sports marketing.
Her grandparents? Not soccer fans. Her mother eventually came around to the sport — but only after Garbowski dug through an old yearbook and discovered her high school even had a soccer team.
Michael Lewis, a professor at Emory University who studies the crossroads of sports analytics and sports marketing, says this kind of slow-building enthusiasm is exactly what he’d expect.
“Soccer is a generational story that’s building generation after generation, but it takes a long, long time,” Lewis said.
Broadly speaking, soccer still trails far behind baseball, basketball, and American football in terms of fan loyalty. Research from Ipsos Sports indicates that only about one in ten Americans consider themselves fans of either U.S. or international soccer.
Lewis noted that Baby Boomers grew up with the traditional “big three” sports, and that early exposure shapes what they watch as adults. Ipsos data confirms that Americans 65 and older are especially likely to identify as fans of those three sports. However, market researchers see more promise among millennials and members of Gen Z — those currently between 14 and 29 years old.
The story of soccer’s slow climb in America goes back decades. In the 1970s, the now-defunct North American Soccer League brought in international stars like Pelé, the three-time World Cup winner from Brazil. By the 1980s, American kids were playing the game — including girls, who gained access to school sports through Title IX, the federal law prohibiting sex-based discrimination in education.
But early coaches — often gym teachers or parents — had little background in the sport. Some learned the rules from books. In communities where football ruled, soccer faced real resistance, with fears it would pull athletes away from the gridiron. Players endured taunts and slurs, and were sometimes even accused of being communists.
“I cannot repeat the things I got called,” said Darin White, 58, who played and later coached soccer at the college level before becoming the executive director of the Center for Sports Analytics at Samford University in Alabama.
Still, kids kept playing. The U.S. hosted the World Cup in 1994, and Major League Soccer launched its first season two years after that. Today’s parents often played the game themselves. Competitive travel teams are now commonplace. MLS has invested in player development through its MLS Next program, the quality of play has improved, and television viewership has risen.
Research from Ipsos shows that roughly half of American sports fans say they got into a sport because of a family connection or because they grew up rooting for a specific team — a dynamic that bodes well for soccer as more parents with playing experience raise the next generation.
The women’s game has also been a significant driver of soccer’s growth, according to Nicholas Watanabe, a professor at the University of South Carolina and author of “The Beautiful Game?”, a book examining soccer’s future. Girls who play as children become fans. Their participation also helps keep youth leagues large enough to remain financially sustainable.
“Without the success and long-standing growth, I don’t think you get this side-by-side effect that also I think has helped the men’s team, too,” Watanabe said.
One example of that momentum is the Kansas City Current, the National Women’s Soccer League team whose stadium is recognized as the first built specifically for a women’s soccer team. The club’s ownership group includes Brittany Mahomes, a former college soccer player and wife of Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes. The Current is serving as the host team for the Netherlands during the World Cup and sent staff members to assist at the camp where Garbowski was volunteering.
Experts are careful to point out that soccer is still not the NFL, which dominates a crowded American sports market.
“The question isn’t, ‘Why aren’t we as big as football?’ Well, we’re not, but we are way closer than the last time we hosted the World Cup,” said White, who is researching how Americans develop a connection to the sport.
Challenges remain. The world’s top players still largely compete in European leagues, and many dedicated American fans follow those overseas clubs rather than MLS teams — which limits the money flowing back into developing the sport domestically. But White pointed out that American players are increasingly breaking into those elite European leagues, and the sport’s young U.S. fan base is one that marketers are highly motivated to reach.
“I am more hopeful right now than I’ve ever been in my life,” White said. “And I’ve been a soccer missionary, if you will.”
Back at the library in Lenexa, Kansas, one mother steadied her 1-year-old daughter’s hands as the little girl toddled toward a ball and gave it a kick with a chubby bare foot. Nearby, another toddler practiced saying “Messi” — the last name of the Argentine star whose team is based close to the area during the tournament.
Jude Cornell, meanwhile, had moved on from tossing cones to tugging at his ears — joining several other toddlers sidelined not by injury, but by teething.
His mother asked the 17-month-old if he wanted to play soccer, noting that some local programs accept children as young as 2. He didn’t answer.
“You don’t know,” she said. “Maybe like next spring or summer we start trying.”
