So far, I've attended the games in DC and the Flamengo/Chelsea game in Philly. All have been good. The Flamengo/Chelsea game had the best atmosphere of any game I've ever attended thanks to the massive Flamengo contingent. Al-Hilal had great support as well and the attendance at last night's game was 16K+ ... that's pretty good given the horrendous heat.
CWC now sitting on 35,995 average while the gold cup is at 20,328. I expect both numbers to grow significantly in the knockout rounds.
The Gold Cup average is flawed, because it counts doubleheaders as distinct matches with identical attendances (ie - they're double-counting every person who buys tickets for them). If you count the doubleheaders correctly, total attendance drops from the Wiki number of 406,551 to 270,084 and drops the average number of tickets distributed per match to 13,504.
"Flawed" is a bit strong. If I bought a ticket to a double-header, and I stayed for both matches, then I "attended" two matches, not one. How many tickets I bought is irrelevant.
In the absence of a tracking method for how many people actually attend each individual match, the number of tickets purchased is actually the only relevant number. A ticket purchaser counts as 2 whether they show up 2 hours before kickoff of the first match or at minute 70 of the second match. That’s not a good way to calculate an average.
Also some or these games are scheduled for better TV times frame in other continents, which affect their local attendance.
That’s the best chance Seattle is going to have all day, and Ferreira, while (sort of) rushed, punts the chance on a mostly-open goal to Mt. Rainier.
At the very least, the CWC will lead to some interesting discussions between owners, sponsors, Apple executives and players during the All Star break, as negotiations for the next CBA are on the horizon.
Great run by Hakimi to spirit himself into the box but Rusnak saw him making the run and decided to ignore him and mark space.
For the players it has opened a very new talking point with prize money distribution. This tournament is probably looked at as a success for FIFA with the opening round games to this point. Most of the games have been interesting and you might have as many upsets as blowouts. According to Google they've already had a million in attendance already for the first 30 games.
Overall not too bad a performance by Seattle at the tournament considering the opposition. Scored 2 goals and never lost by more than 2. I was expecting much worse.
Well that's a once every four year thing. But I think the big question is about where MLS wants to be. By 2033 I'd hope MLS teams will be able to compete with the best in the Americas and as we've seen, there's still some way to go.
Is it? If MLS wins CCC in 27 & 28 does the 2 teams playing in the tournament get the prize money or the teams that win CCC to qualify? If I'm the MLSPA and my union members win a tournament that pays 5 million(CCC) but each team also gets another 9.55 for punching their ticket into CWC 2029, you don't think that will be a talking point? Who gets the prize money, the players on the team that qualified in 27 or the players who completed in 29?
There is money to be made from International tournaments which MLS doesn't seem to never care about. Hopefully they change their minds after this CWC and in the not so distant future work something out with CONCACAF and CONMEBOL to join Libertadores/Sudamericana. That's another bag of millions left in the table. The prize money Inter Miami will get if they advance; $21M total if they advance to R16. There’s serious money at stake for Inter Miami CF as they face Palmeiras in their final match of the FIFA Club World Cup Group Stage.After drawing with Al Ahly and beating Porto, Miami earned $3 million from the group stage and are now chasing another $7.5 million for advancing… pic.twitter.com/h3rmZSpqDV— Favian Renkel (@FavianRenkel) June 23, 2025
aka Eiffel Tower 2 Space Needle 0 I enjoy that both teams use the citys' famous monuments prominently in their respective crests.
To be honest, there was never any real money to be won. The US Open Cup probably cost more to play-in than win. Until recently the CONCACAF Champions League was only worth 500K for the winner. Now you can have some synergy between these tournaments as they can actually make money for players and owners. The biggest thing to grow this region is revenue. Technically FFIFA invested 38.2 million over four years for teams that qualify for CWC. You even have incentive to keep up in the standings in case one team repeats in the four year period.
Me too. The most important thing this tournament proved is that Seattle is 3 goals better than Inter Milan.
Why wouldn’t the Union push for the money to primarily go to the league as a whole, and use it to increase the cap? Spread the wealth, so to speak. It would address the inequity you’ve mentioned and also do what unions do…protect their median and below workers.
I don't think negotiating windfall competition payments will be an issue for the owners. If the players want 50% then so be it. I think it's a bigger issue for the union because they represent the interests of 860+ players not 30 or 60. But I don't think the issue will make it break CBA negotiations. I'm more interested in how MLS evens the playing field with the top Brazilian and Argentinian teams, the obvious answer being bigger payrolls.
Bigger payrolls would be nice but how you can spend going forward to me is bigger. 50% sounds about right going forward but I think letting sporting directors buildings teams the way they want with less mechanisms would help. Figure a way to have a ceiling and a floor while keeping DP's seems like the obvious answer but who knows.