After gossip of NWSL expansion swirled the internet earlier this week, it was finally revealed on Wednesday what the fuss was all about. Louisville’s expansion team has officially rebranded itself as Racing Louisville FC.
Despite never playing a single game of soccer, this is the second name that the club has carried.
Back in October, the NWSL announced that a team would be coming to Louisville, Kentucky. Its name was Proof Louisville FC.
As a reference to the city’s bourbon industry, the name wasn’t enduring enough for fans. Thus, the people behind-the-scenes at Louisville had to change course.
“We just wanted to involve our supporters more than we did before,” Louisville City FC President Brad Estes told the Louisville Courier-Journal. “We wanted to engage all of our stakeholders, really, everybody in the community, supporters, owners, players, we just wanted to do a more robust process.”
Pivoting from bourbon to horse racing, the expansion side’s new name strikes a better chord. It also harkens back to many historic clubs like Racing Club de Avellaneda and RC Lens.
Besides the new name, the club also unveiled its colors and crest. Lavender and deep violet are the primary team colors, while mint green serves as an accent color. The crest itself comprises of a combination of two pieces of imagery. An ‘X’ in the center represents the city’s status as a geographic waypoint, while four fleur-de-lis illustrate the area’s heritage.
Response to the new name and crest has been positive. There shouldn’t be any petitions on Change.org to protest the name this time around.
Oddly enough, this isn’t anything new with Louisville City FC. The club’s USL Championship side went through a similar situation last December.
As a way to signify the team’s move into the newly constructed Lynn Family Stadium, the club unveiled a redesigned crest for its men’s side. Yet, four days after the launch, Louisville City announced that it had abandoned the new crest.
“To be blunt, our recent brand rollout has failed you,” said Estes in a familiar-sounding statement. “We had the best intentions, but we lost sight of our responsibility to engage you in the process. We make no excuses – we simply commit to making it right.”
Hopefully the club has now learned its lesson and can now focus on the product it puts out on the field. If their USL Championship team is any indication, fans can expect great things.
