Ever since Sacramento Republic FC took the region by storm in 2014, its thousands of fans have been waiting for this moment.

Or so they thought.

For four years, Republic fans have assumed that Sacramento’s bid was a shoo-in for Major League Soccer’s next round of expansion.

MLS Commissioner Don Garber said as much, telling that other newspaper’s columnist Marcos Bréton that it was more of a “when” than an “if” that the Republic would be announced as a team for this country’s (and Canada’s) top soccer league.

Four bids were considered finalists for this round of expansion, in which MLS would choose two among Cincinnati, Detroit, Nashville and Sacramento to enter the league in the next few years.

Two weeks ago, representatives from all four cities convened at MLS headquarters in New York to make their final presentations.

Again, this was considered a mere formality for Sacramento, which had already checked all of the boxes of criteria that the league set.

Built-in fan base? Check: The Republic has been in the top two in USL for attendance in all of its four years, averaging five figures every season.

TV market size? Check: Among the four bids, the greater Sacramento area ranked No. 2 in population, behind only Detroit.

Soccer-specific stadium plan? Check: The Republic has already leveled the ground for its downtown Railyards Stadium and can put shovels in the ground as soon as MLS gives it the green light.

Ownership group with deep pockets? Check: Billionaire Kevin Nagle combined with Meg Whitman and the York family to form a solid ownership group that contains the funds required for a $150 million expansion fee and further development.

Except for, as we just learned, maybe Nagle isn’t a billionaire, and maybe the Republic doesn’t have said funds.

So the presentations came and went and only Nashville was awarded a franchise, with MLS announcing Wednesday that Tennessee would be accepted into the league in the near future.

And then MLS announced that it would wait until the new year to determine the second team, with the general consensus believing that it will come down to either Sacramento or Cincy.

Shortly after the announcement, and after the Nagle “situation” was reported on, Nagle himself released a statement on the bid.

“One area remains open to improvement (in our bid): the strength of our funding plan,” Nagle wrote in a letter released on the Republic’s website. “Towards the latter stages of the expansion process, we recognized the need to bolster our overall capital structure. This challenge primarily emerged as a result of how much the financial picture of our MLS bid has changed.

“Since our investor group originally formed in 2014, the combined costs of the MLS expansion fee and our world-class downtown stadium plan have risen by nearly $150 million,” he continued. “While these are typical challenges in business, sports and MLS, the evolving bid costs have required us to revisit and rethink how we will fund the bid.”

Nagle claims to have already put $30 million of his own money into the process. Then he released a call to action to further bolster the ownership group, which is where the uncertainty lies.

The Whitmans had previously dropped out of the group, only to be reinstated shortly before the bid presentations.

It remains unclear how much the Yorks are involved, although one source laid doubts on the amount of capital they would put forth.

So could the unthinkable really happen — is the Republic snatching defeat from the jaws of victory?

Certainly there will be no early Christmas present for Sacramento fans.

Right now there are too many unknowns to report on — no one will talk on the record about what has happened over the past few months.

But how could Nagle and Company not have known before this point that more funding was needed?

Is it just that the foundation of MLS has changed? What was once a league full of players making $30,000 a year has changed into Arthur Blank’s Atlanta United paying 10-figure transfer fees for acquisitions and flying new players to its headquarters via private jet.

It’s too early to say who’s responsible for this, or even if the Republic will fail to garner that last expansion spot.

However, if it comes out that Sacramento isn’t in this next round of expansion and Nagle fumbled the bid, he’ll join the Maloofs in infamy as incompetent Sacramento area owners.

Right now all the Sacramento community can do is wait and hope that a shining knight rides in on an 11th-hour white horse to save a bid that once was considered a lock.

Oh, how the mighty have fallen.

— Evan Ream’s column publishes Sundays. Reach him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter at @EvanReam