SAN JOSE — The capacity crowd of 18,000 had waited a long time for this, to sit in a new Earthquakes stadium, to do what soccer crowds do. The home team scored five minutes after the opening kickoff. Clamor ensued.

Fifteen minutes later, when the Quakes’ next goal kissed the back of the net for a 2-0 lead over the Chicago Fire, you could double the clamor.

“It felt like the roof was going to come off the hinges,” said coach Dominic Kinnear.

Just to clarify, there is no roof at Avaya Stadium. There is a canopy over the seats. But that only focused the noise and made it seem much louder, as the Earthquakes held on for their 2-1 victory to provide as grand an opener as a grand opening could want.

Chris Wondolowski, the Quakes’ most accomplished player, felt as if he were running around in some sort of perfect soccer picture all Sunday afternoon. A structure built just for soccer, with exquisite turf and fans practically on top of the action.

“It’s a professional atmosphere, not a college field,” said Wondolowski. “It’s yours. It’s the Earthquakes’.”

And you know what else Sunday proved? Confirmed? That Major League Soccer, of which the San Jose franchise was a charter member, should never have left the Bay Area in 2005 when the team’s former owners decided they didn’t have enough support for a new stadium. It was a stupid notion then. In retrospect, it was an even more stupid notion.

True, you might say it turned out all right in the long run. New owners John Fisher and Lew Wolff eventually were found, and they rebirthed the Earthquakes as an expansion franchise two years later. Fisher and Wolff then gradually assembled the plan that led to the Avaya Stadium project on Coleman Avenue. But the MLS lost two years of building-soccer-interest progress in the Bay Area, needlessly depriving local fans of what they so obviously craved and forcing the expansion team to go through reconstitution struggles at its temporary home field, Buck Shaw Stadium on the Santa Clara University campus.

Don Garber, the MLS commissioner then and now, attended Sunday’s game. He came close to admitting that he has regrets about allowing the Quakes to exit in 2005 and move to Houston as the Dynamo franchise.

“Leaving San Jose was heart-wrenching,” Garber said. “I look back on it with a touch of sadness. But seeing how it has come back with new owners and what’s happened with this stadium … Sometimes, you’ve got to take a little pain to be healthier.”

Garber also reminded reporters that when the Quakes left a decade ago, he had said the MLS would probably be back. But that only makes you wonder even more why they left at all.

Plainly, San Jose and Northern California is a suitable soccer market. And now, it has one of the better soccer venues in North America. Frank Yallop, coach of the opposing Chicago Fire and a former Quakes coach, said he “got goose bumps” just walking onto the field for the pregame introductions.

Before then, the celebratory moments were also handled well, with many politicians, a few children, senior citizen cheerleader Krazy George, local soccer icon Brandi Chastain and original 1974 Earthquakes player Paul Child.

But the stadium is built for soccer, not folderol. It’s not a spectacular or imposing stadium. It’s just a really good stadium, a fun stadium, an excellent athletic stage, a place you can go watch a game with your family — or with your pals to hang out at the end zone bar. Most games are expected to be sellouts this season, especially with the team off to a winning start.

Ultimately, the only Avaya drawback might be that it’s a little too small and could use a few thousand more seats, though Garber has his own idea about that.

“I’d rather have games be sold out and create demand and expand later if necessary,” Garber said.

The first MLS game in history was played in San Jose, at Spartan Stadium in 1996. Wondolowski was in the stadium as a 13-year-old fan for the 30,000-seat sellout. But the momentum and full-house enthusiasm didn’t hold. This time around, with this stadium … well, after Sunday’s clamor, no pessimism is allowed. Tighten those hinges.

Read Mark Purdy’s blog at blogs.mercurynews.com/purdy. Contact him at mpurdy@mercurynews.com. Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/MercPurdy.