Bethlehem Steel FC 2019 schedule released

Talen Energy Stadium will be seeing plenty of soccer in the first three months of the USL Championship with eight Bethlehem Steel FC games scheduled for the team’s “temporary” home over the first three months of the season.

After opening the season against Birmingham Legion FC, the Steel will return home for a three-game home stand in March and will have three-game stretches in Chester in May and June.

Though we won’t know until the release of the Major League Soccer schedule how many games will be part of double-headers in Chester or will overlap with first team road games, the schedule does represent a shift from the Sunday afternoon heavy schedule from the Steel’s first three seasons playing at Goodman Stadium.

The 2019 schedule doesn’t include any Sunday dates; 25 of the 34 games are on Saturdays, two are on Fridays and the other seven games are on weekdays (one Tuesday, four Wednesday and one Thursday). The Steel will play its Thursday game on the Fourth of July at the Pittsburgh Riverhounds.

In addition to home games at Talen Energy Stadium, the team will play at MLS venues Children’s Mercy Stadium in Kansas City and Audi Field in Washington D.C. and three NFL/CFL venues against Indy Eleven, Nashville SC and Ottawa Fury. Road games against Louisville City FC and Memphis 901 FC will both be played at baseball stadiums.

Kickoff times have not been released.

In addition to the schedule release, the league has also announced the playoff format, which will be expanded from eight teams in each of the two conferences to 10 teams from each in 2019. The 7-10 seeds will be part of a play-in round to start the playoffs on October 23. USL Cup will be played some time between November 14 and 18.

The Union announced last month that the team would be playing at Talen Energy Stadium in 2019 because a suitable venue in the Lehigh Valley could not be secured. The team elected to keep Bethlehem in the name because they say they are committed to returning to the Lehigh Valley.