1970: In the Atlanta Chiefs' final match of the NASL season, they defeated the visiting Washington Darts 5-2 at Tara Stadium. Henry Largie and Art Welch each scored two goals for Atlanta with Alec Papadakis adding one. Atlanta ended the season on a six-match winning streak, but narrowly missed out on the NASL championship series. There were questions on if the Chiefs would return for the 1971 season, the Booster Club was working to raise $100,000 in season ticket sales over the next two weeks. Dr. Clyde Partin of Emory University led the Club and eventually helped the Chiefs continue on in 1971. 1995: Bruce Murray and Greg Sheen scored for the Atlanta Ruckus in a 2-2 draw against the Vancouv

We're excited to announce that Fanatiz is now part of the SDH family. You can support the show by subscribing to Fanatiz at the following link: www.fntz.co/SoccerDownHere. Fanatiz is a high value streaming platform that broadcasts sporting events and channels online, live and on VOD. With a monthly or annual subscription, you can access the best sports content on all your screens and favorite devices. You can watch channels like beIN Sports, GolTV, and Real Madrid TV in both English and Spanish. You can watch league and cup matches from Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Uruguay, Spain, France, Turkey and more. You can watch Copa Libertadores and Copa Sudamericana action in both Englis

1968: Santos of Brazil defeated the Atlanta Chiefs 6-2 at Atlanta Stadium in front of the largest crowd for a soccer match in the Southeast at that time. Atlanta actually opened the scoring in the first minute. Emment Kapengwe said: “We won the toss and our captain Vic chose the kick-off. Our number nine put the ball to Fred who flicked it back to Vic at four. Then Vic passed a long ball to me on the Santos goal mouth. I fed the ball back to Fred who blasted home the opener under a minute. Santos had never been scored on like that before and they cheered for us.” (Pele and Vic Crowe in action at Atlanta Stadium. Pele had a hat trick in Santos' 6-2 win.) 1998: The Atlanta Ruckus lost its fina

by Jason Longshore We had some requests for a throwback scarf and we decided to combine a couple of elements from our history into this special, limited edition scarf. Jarrett and I started the Peachtree Post weekly podcast in mid-2016 and it grew quickly into the Soccer Down Here daily show that continues today. Our first SDH scarf had our signoff, "Mucha Plata Y'all" on one side and we've brought that back here too. This is a one-time print and there are only a few left for preorder. $20 (including shipping) is the price, send us an email at soccerdownhere at gmail dot com to reserve yours. Thanks for supporting Soccer Down Here and thanks to all of you who have been with us since the

by Bart Keeler (photo courtesy of Orlando City SC) Fans of the U.S. men’s national team have been waiting four years for a chance to watch their team reclaim a spot in the FIFA World Cup. On Wednesday, the USMNT saw its road to redemption unfold. The 14 matches over seven two-match windows filled with each ball selected. Immediately after the rush that came with the draw for the Concacaf Qualifiers for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022, anxiety set in. For good reason, USMNT fans probably experienced some traumatic flashbacks to matches that did their team in the previous World Cup qualifying cycle. Concacaf Qualifiers aren’t meant to be easy. If the USMNT want to qualify for Qatar 2022, it will

by Bart Keeler Concacaf conducted its World Cup Qualifying Preliminary Draw yesterday and the USMNT learned its schedule for the qualifying process, starting June 2021. Yesterday, the U.S. men’s national soccer team found out its qualification schedule for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar. FIFA conducted the draw for the Concacaf Qualifiers for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 at its headquarters in Zurich. Due to its second-highest FIFA ranking in the region, the USMNT automatically qualifies for the final round and was drawn into slot four in the final-round schedule. The USMNT will start its path to Qatar 2022 in June 2021 on the road against the winner of the playoff between the Group A and

1971: Nick Papadakis scored the only goal for the Atlanta Chiefs in their 1-0 win at Busch Stadium against the St. Louis Stars. The goal came in the 87th minute and was disputed by the Stars' players. Per Doug Grow of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, St. Louis players shoved the referee and assistant referee and threw a "few wild swings" that did not connect. Stars executive vice president and U.S. Soccer Hall of Fame member Walter Giesler said: "I've seen some terrible calls, some lousy officiating, but this was the lousiest. You can quote me on that, I'll get fined by the league, but I don't give a damn." 1996: Alex Bahr's second goal of the season gave the Atlanta Ruckus a 1-0 win in A-Leag

Four of the top flight leagues are back underway in South America, while six are waiting to get started again. Venezuela and Chile: Neither one has a date set for their return. Chilean teams are currently training. Venezuela has proposed multiple bubbles for their return to play in late August, but nothing has been finalized. Bolivia: The national team will start training on September 1 with the clubs set to return to play later that month. Colombia: Teams are training currently and were initially planning to restart the league campaign at the end of this month. Now, it appears they will get started before the middle of September. Argentina: Teams have just started training again, with the

1970: Art Welch's hat trick carried the Atlanta Chiefs to a 5-2 win on the road against the Dallas Tornado in NASL play. The 3 goals from Welch took him to 10 for the season at that point. Dave Metchick and Henry Largie also scored for Atlanta, Kirk Apostolidis scored twice for Dallas in the loss. 1978: More news was revealed about the return of the Atlanta Chiefs after Dick Cecil and Al Thornwill bought the Colorado Caribous to move them to Atlanta. The purchase price of the Denver club was over $1.5 million. 18,000 attendance at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium to break even, but the club expected that to take some time. They were hoping for an average of 10,000-12,000 in 1979. 1980: Parkv

16-year old Efrain Morales will join Atlanta United as a MLS Homegrown Player on January 1, 2021. The young defender has been part of Atlanta's academy from the first class, progressing to the point that he has earned U.S. Youth National Team call-ups through the U17 level and a trial earlier this year with Manchester United. Vice President and Technical Director Carlos Bocanegra said: “We’re pleased to announce Efrain as our latest product to sign out of our Academy. Efrain has been with us since we started the program in 2016, and credit goes to the hard work of our entire Academy staff as Efrain has developed consistently, but still shows a lot of potential. He’s a local kid who joined ou

A look back at Atlanta soccer history that happened on August 9.

A strong performance from Atlanta United 2 only resulted in a 1-1 draw after Charleston's Mauro Cichero scored in the fourth minute of stoppage time on Wednesday night. Amadou Macky Diop scored for the second consecutive match to give Atlanta the lead in the second half. Highlights: Thoughts from interim Atlanta United 2 manager Tony Annan after the match: “I was happy with the team’s performance tonight. I think every week, every game we are getting better and better. We are starting to look like an Atlanta United team. A team where our build is getting better, our press is getting better. That’s to be expected since we’ve been working on it. The guys are taking in the information and are

August 2nd in Atlanta soccer history