By Michael Lewis

FrontRowSoccer.com Editor

The Rochester Lancers have received one last deadline extension on their return to the great indoors.

Lancers president Soccer Sam Fantauzzo said Saturday morning that his team has been given an extension until Aug. 31 by Major Arena Soccer League to get a obtain for the 2017-18 season.

MASL commissioner Joshua Schaub gave the Lancers one last extension, Fantauzzo said. The league needs to put together a schedule so teams can promote their games in September for the fall and winter.

“Right now the dates are a joke,” Fantauzzo said on his show, Kick This. “So we’re waiting for some of the holds to be released and that could change.”

Lancers co-owner and head coach Doug Miller has been negotiating with the Blue Cross Arena to secure playing dates.

The big sticking point with the 10,664-seat BCA has been playing dates. After you slot in the Rochester Americans (hockey), the Razorsharks (basketball) and Knighthawks (lacrosse), there are few, if any, viable weekend dates for the Lancers. The BCA also has some hold dates for potential concerts.

The 13 playing dates available to the Lancers have been NFL Sunday and weekdays.

Last week Miller came with a creative solution in which the arena would give the team two of those hold dates and the soccer club would hold doubleheaders with some of the other teams at the venue, while accepting some weekday dates.

“If he can give us one or two of those hold dates — it’s 20 percent chance it’s going to happen – I think then we can move forward and bring the Lancers back for indoor,” Miller said last week, referring to BCA general manager Jeff Calkins.

Front Row Soccer editor Michael Lewis has covered 13 World Cups (eight men, five women), seven Olympics and 25 MLS Cups. He has written about New York City FC, New York Cosmos, the New York Red Bulls and both U.S. national teams for Newsday and has penned a soccer history column for the Guardian.com. Lewis, who has been honored by the Press Club of Long Island and National Soccer Coaches Association of America, is the former editor of BigAppleSoccer.com. He has written seven books about the beautiful game and has published ALIVE AND KICKING The incredible but true story of the Rochester Lancers. It is available at Amazon.com.