The 30th MLS expansion team will be announced next year

On Tuesday, Major League Soccer commissioner Don Garber spoke at the CAA World Congress of Sports conference in New York and confirmed that the next and last expansion team “will be appointed sometime in the next 12 months.” Currently there are 27 teams competing in the 2021 MLS campaign and next season Charlotte FC, the 28th team, will be added to the competition.

Las Vegas could become the 30th team

By 2023 there will be a total of 29 teams because St. Louis City FC will join the league that year and the final expansion team will be added by 2024 or 2025. All signs indicate that Las Vegas will be the city to have a Major League Soccer team and the confirmation will be announced next year.

Multiple groups are backing Las Vegas and they are waiting for Major League Soccer to approve the plan. Other cities that are making a case to have a team in the league are San Diego and Phoenix, but the ‘city that never sleeps’ is the front-runner so far.

Las Vegas has three top-tier professional sports teams with the NHL’s Golden Knights, NFL’s Raiders and WNBA’s Aces. They also built a brand new stadium that was inaugurated during the summer and it is the home of the Las Vegas Raiders. The Allegiant Stadium hosted the Gold Cup final between the USMNT and Mexico with a sold out crowd, more than 61,000 fans.

"That market, it continues to explode from a population growth perspective," Garber told ESPN in August. "We've seen the success of certainly the Knights and big events. Las Vegas is an interesting market. We do want to secure our 30th team so that we can have a fully expanded league by the World Cup in 2026, so we'll continue to focus on that market."