Dundee chief John Nelms has revealed he wants to have another crack at playing a Premiership game in the United States.
The Dark Blues and Celtic explored the possibility of doing just that in 2015. The idea was eventually abandoned two years later but Nelms insists the game was very close to going ahead. In May, FIFA set up a working group to look at the potential impact of competitive domestic matches being played abroad, and American Nelms admitted he would jump at the chance of playing a game in his homeland if the opportunity arose.
The Dundee managing director said: “Is it something we’d look at again? Yes, we’re open to all of these things. We’re in the entertainment business so anything we can do to entertain, we’d certainly do that. That project nearly happened, it was very, very close. It would have been fantastic for everybody, financially for the football club, for the eyes that you’d get on the game, everything we thought that that would be fantastic for.
“The NFL are doing it just now, they were in Germany last weekend. They see the benefits in doing that. Now, with benefits also comes the negative side of it which is making sure that your national identity and the league’s identity is there.”
Nelms admitted the American MLS sides were wary about allowing foreign teams to play league games on their soil because of the huge interest in Mexican football in the US. Nelms added: “In the United States, their concern was the Mexican League potentially playing a lot of their games because of the loopholes that we found and how we could make it happen.
“In the US, especially in the southern states, the following for Mexican football is huge. If you put the two games up against each other, an MLS game versus a Mexican League game, you’d have a big group of people that would choose the Mexican League game in certain states in the US. So I understand what the fears were.”
Nelms is fully aware that there are still daunting obstacles to be overcome before any Premiership game could be played in the States. He added: “There are an enormous amount of hoops to jump through. It’s FIFA, it’s UEFA and the local leagues.
“But if it ever arose again that we’re able to do that, we have a little bit more of an understanding of how it works now and we’d certainly be up for something like that.
“The question is how it would affect the MLS and I understand that. If we had English Premier League games being played up here, I think we’d be a bit concerned that our stadiums might be empty that week because Man Utd are playing Man City at Hampden.
“We’d all have a little bit of a fear of that so I understand it.”