Fra Noi Embrace Your Inner Italian
As the point person for Lega Serie A USA, it’s Andy Mitchell’s job to raise the profile of Italian soccer in one of the world’s most coveted markets.
Since 1898, when Italians have wanted to enjoy calcio at its finest, they’ve turned to Lega Serie A, one of the top domestic soccer leagues in the world. In the spring of 2022, the Italian league opened an office in New York City and tasked Andy Mitchell with convincing more Americans to join in the fun.
Calcio is the most popular sport in Italy and its national team is second only to Brazil in most FIFA World Cup wins. In the United States, interest in soccer is on the rise, but it still lags far behind baseball, basketball and American football, and knowledge of Serie A is largely limited to true fans of the sport.
Mitchell, the CEO and managing director of Lega Serie A USA, says that when he was approached about the job, his enthusiasm was off the charts.
“It was clear to me calcio was under-leveraged in the market and had a high ceiling, with the sport continuing to grow here,” Mitchell notes.
Mitchell says his main goal is to spread the word in America that Serie A is one of the top three global leagues, playing in a country that Americans love with top American players thriving on the pitch.
Five members of the United States national team currently star in standout Italian clubs, including Christian Pulisic, the 26-year-old winger for AC Milan, nicknamed “Captain America.” Also, nine of the 20 Serie A clubs now have North American ownership, including powerhouses Inter Milan and AC Milan.
Another important goal for Serie A USA, according to Mitchell, is to partner with community soccer organizations. Their first such collaboration has been with Street Soccer USA, a nonprofit that fights poverty and strengthens communities across the United States through soccer. In May 2023, Serie A USA and Street Soccer USA opened the Teddy van Beuren Street Soccer Park and Learning Center at Community School 55 in the Bronx, New York City, creating an accessible space for young people to learn soccer while developing important social and educational skills.
“The Serie A Calcio in the Community program is central to our efforts to leverage the profile and platform of Italian soccer to inspire the next generation,” Mitchell says. “We’re excited to see the difference we can make in collaboration with our nonprofit partners.”
Serie A USA also supports a youth soccer initiative in Little Havana, Miami, and Mitchell says his organization is working with Street Soccer USA to expand to one or two new cities in 2025.
Though Mitchell isn’t of Italian descent, he says that, through his work with Serie A USA, he has come to appreciate all aspects of Italian culture and has even begun learning to speak Italian.
“Interacting daily with the Italian community within Serie A and the clubs has deepened my understanding of Italy’s rich cultural nuances and the people behind the sport,” Mitchell says.
Before his current role with Serie A USA, Mitchell spent about a dozen years working for Facebook and Meta, including roles as Facebook’s news and global media partnerships director and as Meta’s head of global media accounts.
“Prior to joining Serie A, I loved everything about football both from a cultural and sporting standpoint and was following the business of the sport as part of my role at Facebook and general interest in the media business,” Mitchell says.
So has Serie A USA begun to grab the interest of American soccer fans? Mitchell says the early indications are positive.
There were two Serie A games broadcast on CBS last year and the viewership grew from the match in August to the one in December. Serie A USA’s online newsletter, Calcio Weekly, has been consistently increasing its readership and the organization’s Instagram page has doubled its audience over the last 18 months, Mitchell says.
“Across every dimension, the business is on a great trajectory,” Mitchell says.
The article above appears in the April 2025 issue of the print version of Fra Noi. Our gorgeous, monthly magazine contains a veritable feast of news and views, profiles and features, entertainment and culture. To subscribe, click here.
