He’s Louisville City’s all-time leading scorer. Now, he’s with Lexington Sporting Club.
The most prolific goal scorer in Louisville City’s history has traded the purple of the club he became synonymous with for the green of the Lexington Sporting Club team he now represents.
For 31-year-old Cameron Lancaster, the offseason move 75 miles east from LouCity — a perennial contender in the USL Championship (the second tier of American men’s professional soccer) — to LSC of USL League One (the third tier) is a chance to start a new phase in his career.
“I think the main thing that stood out was their ambition and their ambition to be one of the top clubs in the USL,” Lancaster said about LSC during an interview with the Herald-Leader. “That really drew me to signing here and everything’s come to fruition. Everything is as I thought it was going to be, and I’m enjoying it a lot.”
The signing of Lancaster was a major coup for Lexington Sporting Club, which begins its second-ever USL League One season on Saturday night with a home match at Toyota Stadium in Georgetown.
Lancaster has the best credentials of any LSC player to date: With LouCity, he scored 88 goals in all competitions across eight seasons, and was a member of LouCity’s USL Championship-winning teams in 2017 and 2018.
He scored 80 goals in USL Championship regular season play with both Louisville City and Nashville SC (now an MLS club). That total is the third-most in that league’s history.
Last season, Lancaster tied for LouCity’s team lead in goals with nine, but in December the club announced it was unable to agree to contract terms with him ahead of the 2024 season.
In January, Lancaster signed with Lexington. He told the Herald-Leader that conversations with first-year LSC manager Darren Powell, men’s sporting director Sam Stockley and members of ownership convinced him to sign with the club.
“Their vision just drew me in. Like totally,” Lancaster said. “Obviously I was at Louisville for a long time, and I was able to see them go from nearly nothing to what they are now. And it just seemed very interesting and enticing to try and redo and rebuild something similar.”
Cameron Lancaster brings historic goal scoring to Lexington Sporting Club
Lancaster’s playing pedigree is clear: A native of London, the Englishman was part of the Tottenham Hotspur Academy and made one senior team appearance for the club during the 2011-12 English Premier League season.
Ever since he moved to Louisville City for that club’s debut season in 2015, Lancaster has proven his scoring worth in the United States. Now, he plans to bring that same ability to Lexington.
“My main goals are to win with the team. Taking each game as it comes, trying to get three points with every single game. Home, away, wherever it is,” Lancaster said.
What has Powell — an Englishman who was appointed LSC’s manager in November and has previously served as a coach and academy director at various levels of American soccer — observed about Lancaster during LSC’s preseason?
“Cam, he’s going to be a mentor. He’s seen a lot. He’s seen the different levels. He knows what it takes. He’s played in the Premier League. Those experiences are what some of the younger players aspire to have,” Powell told the Herald-Leader. “When things happen ... he just keeps everything calm. He keeps everybody in a good place, with good energy.”
At 31, Lancaster is one of the oldest players on a retooled LSC roster for the 2024 season. But, he doesn’t feel his age.
“Physically, I feel like I’m in the best shape of my career. ... I feel great physically. Mentally, (I’m) on point,” he said.
Powell noted how he’s already seen Lancaster fill a mentor role for some of the younger players, including forward Issac Cano, the former Paul Laurence Dunbar High School standout who is spending the 2024 season on loan with Lexington from LouCity.
“You don’t score the amount of goals he’s scored without being a dedicated professional,” Powell said. “That’s what we want. When you have dedicated professionals, younger players can look up to them and I think that’s of great importance to this club moving forward.”
Lancaster, LSC prepare for USL League One season opener
Lancaster said the ability to get game minutes was a key part of the pitch from Lexington Sporting Club when he was being recruited to the team.
But Lancaster listed several other elements of the ongoing LSC project as selling points that excite him.
This includes the upcoming completion of a soccer-specific stadium in Lexington off Athens Boonesboro Road near Interstate 75. LSC already has a training complex at this site, and the stadium is set to host the club’s senior men’s team, a recently Division One-sanctioned USL Women’s Super League team and LSC’s youth clubs when it opens in August.
“There’s going to be a lot of opportunities at the club, in the city, especially once everything’s built. ... It’s going to be a really great place to be,” said Lancaster, who will be one of LSC’s three captains this season. “I kind of wanted to set some foundations in my career, in my life, and this seemed like the perfect place for it.”
In the immediate future, Lancaster is just days away from trying to make his mark on his debut with Lexington Sporting Club, a team that last season finished in ninth place out of 12 teams and 11 points out of the playoffs.
“The one thing that’s impressed me is there’s been a consistent improvement on the last game that we’ve played,” Lancaster said of LSC’s growth during preseason. “Each game there’s been something that we’ve improved on. We haven’t necessarily dipped in any scenarios in the game. I think that’s all you can ask for: Just constant, steady improvement.”
Next match
Northern Colorado Hailstorm FC at Lexington Sporting Club
What: USL League One season opener
When: 7 p.m. Saturday
Where: Toyota Stadium in Georgetown
Live video stream: ESPN Plus
Tickets: www.lexsporting.com/tickets/
This story was originally published March 6, 2024 at 9:56 AM.
