Updated Seeding: 1. DC United 10 pts +6 - QUALIFIED, all games complete 2. Club America 9pts +7 (3 played) - can get all 12 points, and are likely to 3. LA Galaxy 7pts +9 (3 played) - QUALIFIED, last game going to be important as we are currently tied with Queretaro 4. Queretaro 7 pts +9 - QUALIFIED, all games complete 5. Seattle Sounders 7 pts +3 - QUALIFIED, all games complete 6. Saprissa 6pts +4 (3 played) - game vs. Santos Laguna in Mexico on 10/20, big one! Max points of 9 7. RSL 4pts +1 (2 played, 0 goals allowed) - max points of 10, both games at home 8. UANL 4pts +1 (2 played, 2 goals allowed) - max points of 10 Tomorrow's Key Games: 9/24 - UANL @Isidro Metapan (should be a win for UANL but Herediano just lost there) 9/24 - Santa Tecla @RSL With the draw today and our GD we pretty much (unless something very, very bad happens) avoid 8th which is a good thing as that likely means we avoid Club America in round 1. The key October games are scheduled as follows: 10/20 Saprissa @SANTOS LAGUNA 10/20 Club America @motagua 10/20 Municipal @RSL 10/21 Herediano @UANL 10/21 LA Galaxy @Communicaciones That's right, we are the last game that matters. So we will know seeding and where we want to be at kick off. Should definitely be the reserves that go down to Guatemala, but we'll know in advance whether they should play sit on the ball/keepaway for 90 minutes, or try to score.
By the way, if RSL take care of business, it will be the first time ever that 4 MLS teams have gone to the quarterfinals.
RSL had to bring in the big guns after Santa Tecla jumped out to a 1-0 lead, but the subs made the difference. Three points. Tigres also got the job done with a 2-1 win over Isidro Metapan. So with that, going into October: Updated Seeding: 1. DC United 10 pts +6 - QUALIFIED, all games complete 2. Club America 9pts +7 (3 played) - can get all 12 points, and are likely to 3. LA Galaxy 7pts +9 (3 played) - QUALIFIED, max points of 10 4. Queretaro 7 pts +9 - QUALIFIED, all games complete 5. Seattle Sounders 7 pts +3 - QUALIFIED, all games complete 6. RSL 7pts +2 (3 played, 1 goal allowed) - max points of 10, down to game vs. Municipal, just need draw 7. UANL 7pts +2 (3 played, 2 goals allowed) - max points of 10, down to game vs. Herediano, just need draw 8. Saprissa 6pts +4 (3 played) - game vs. Santos Laguna in Mexico on 10/20, big one! Max points of 9 Key October games: 10/20 Saprissa @SANTOS LAGUNA 10/20 Club America @motagua 10/20 Municipal @RSL 10/21 Herediano @UANL 10/21 LA Galaxy @Communicaciones There are a lot of teams at the 10 pt mark, and GD matters, so scenarios are a crapshoot. I'm really thankful for going last, and there is a scenario where we might prefer a loss (no joke) to meet DC United instead of Tigres. See you in October.
So this happens this week. I'll update seeding after coming home tomorrow. Some pretty big games Tuesday night that will dictate a ton. Hopefully this will wash the sour taste of that Portland game out of my mouth. Because the SKC game means so much, this is the game for the scrubs.
Yep, our starting XI won't even make this trip…. time for the bench to show our first XI-slackers how it's done….
I know this is kind of @Berks territory so she can go through all the permutations but if we win tomorrow, we'll (almost 100%) avoid a Mexican team in the first round. We'd be the top seed and the only teams that can take the 8th seed are Herediano (if they beat Tigres) or Seattle (if Herediano fails to beat Tigres). Technically if we win Tigres can jump ahead of us (if they best our win by 7 goals) but the basic idea is if we win tomorrow, we miss a Mexican team in the first round.
I was just about to write exactly this. It's BIG, BIG news. I'll get into more detail in a second, but it's there for the taking. Bruce, you better have reviewed the results and know what this means. Kyle McCarthy @kylejmccarthy 43m43 minutes ago Club América's 1-1 draw at Motagua means LA Galaxy can claim top #SCCL seed with win at Comunicaciones (barring Tigres blowout win). DON'T EFFING SCREW IT UP. WE NEED SOME GOOD NEWS THIS WEEK.
Tonight's Results: RSL 1 - Municipal 0 Santos Laguna 6 - Saprissa 1 (ouch) Club America 1 - Motagua 1 (lifeline for LA!) Updated Seeding Going Into Tomorrow: 1. Club America 10 pts +7 (edging DCU by 1 goal!) 2. DC United 10 pts +6 3. RSL 10 pts +3 4. Santos Laguna 9 pts +9 5. LA Galaxy 7pts +9 (3 played) 6. Queretaro 7 pts +9 7. Seattle Sounders 7 pts +3 8. UANL 7pts +2 (3 played) I worked the permutations, and here you go (without inserting the charts for sake of reading), this is actually surprising: Tigres Result/LA Result = LA match up (red = Mexican team) Tigres WIN (+7 GD or above, or +6 GD w/more than DCU goals scored)/LA LOSS = Club America/Tigres Tigres WIN (6 GD, 4-0 victory)/LA LOSS = DCU Tigres WIN (<6 GD)/LA LOSS = DCU Tigres DRAW/LA LOSS = DCU Tigres LOSS/LA LOSS (non blowout) = RSL Tigres WIN (+7 GD but below LA)/LA WIN = Seattle Tigres WIN (>LA GD)/LA WIN = Queretaro Tigres WIN (<6 GD)/LA WIN = Seattle Tigres LOSS/LA WIN = Seattle/Herediano pending GD Tigres DRAW/LA WIN = Seattle Tigres WIN (+7 GD or above, or +6 GD w/more than DCU goals scored)/LA DRAW = DCU Tigres WIN (6 GD, 4-0 victory)/LA DRAW = Tigres Tigres WIN (<6 GD) /LA DRAW = Tigres Tigres DRAW/LA DRAW = Santos Laguna Tigres LOSS LA DRAW = Santos Laguna Final Thoughts If Tigres has a major blowout victory, and we lose, that causes problems for us. Other than that 1 loss scenario above, if we lose and Tigres wins by a relatively normal margin, we get an MLS team. The problem is actually a DRAW - odds are we get a Mexican team. Usually a draw on the road means a good thing. But in this case if you play the law of averages, a draw is very, very bad as it gives us a Mexican team. To the point where depending on the Tigres game we may very well want to lose. The best situation is to win. That pretty much likely gives us Seattle and we wouldn't have to be waiting for the Tigres game. It would require a miracle of a GD from them. I'm now envisioning a scenario where we score an own goal in the 90th minute to get DCU. OY! Just win, and we face Seattle. Man, who figured we'd be in a scenario where we want to root for a loss or win rather than a draw?
No match up at this stage is ever a gimme but like @Berks I'd still rather take my chances with an MLS team who is also in pre-season. If you want to win the thing you eventually are going to go through a Mexican side but putting that off until you get your fitness and match sharpness up as much as possible should be the goal. Not just that but if you're the #1 seed you can guarantee that you're going to play the 2nd leg at home throughout the tournament. It would also be nice to just have a win.
Final match ups (still mad): Club América v Seattle Santos Laguna v LA Galaxy DC United v Querétaro Real Salt Lake v Tigres UANL Home teams listed first. This could be Don Garber's nightmare. With screwing the pooch we're also in the same bracket as Seattle/Club America. Yay.
Seattle has the team to beat America hopefully torres is fully fit in time and Galaxy could beat Santos.. I predict Seattle vs LA.
So we're going into the quarterfinals against Mexico next year with the following: 1) Juni exploring options in Europe (EEEEEEEEEEEEKKKKKKKKK!) 2) Lots of folks predicting Omar Gonzalez gone 3) Gyasi Zardes in danger of being sold (please no) 4) Gerrard the albatross 5) Rogers as free agent (don't think he's going to want to leave LA since his partner is here) 6) No idea what midfield is going to look like 7) No back up (really) at FB 8) Need new GK Bruce has some MAJOR work to do in the offseason or the game against Santos Laguna is going to be an epic laugher. For the other teams: Seattle - highly dependent on Alonso and if Deuce/Oba are healthy RSL - depends on how they rebuild DCU - bunker and pray + Bill Hamid Comparatively? I think we're the biggest sh*tshow. Major, major work.
.@CONCACAF announced the #LAGalaxy’s 2016 @TheChampions schedule: https://t.co/IojCpBZRnO #SCCL pic.twitter.com/yNQDHoBHvY— LA Galaxy (@LAGalaxy) December 3, 2015 I hope Bruce realizes nobody at CONCACAF is going to help him and schedules competitive friendlies, even if we come up against much fitter teams and get run off the park it could be a good thing. Playing random college teams aren't going to help us much.
It would be a good idea to try and schedule Brazilian clubs. In Jan/Feb that's the highest rated competition you can get that are somewhat match fit because they're playing in the State Championships. Clubs have been known to have friendlies during the State Championships. Especially the big ones because the State Championships tend to be cake walk for them in early matches.
At least so far, we got a friendly again with FC Shirak in Jan. but, not sure if they'd be considered competitive... ? Unless the boys have some pact of keeping themselves in top, regular season form, and Stevie finally gets MLS fit, I'm afraid we'll be able to focus solely on MLS since we'll bow out of CCL. I highly doubt they convene for any sort of practice and such during the offseason but, some of them do spend some time together apparently... https://t.co/51UCpslg8I
February 24th is the first game??!?!? Jesus. That is EARLY. What is also a bummer is that we host first and go on the road second. Blegh.
All Rowe had to do was stall for 15 seconds and we could have avoided playing an in-season Mexican team. I know... I'm a bitter man. On the bright side at least we won't have to worry about CCL fixture congestion after the first two games.