Oops, i meant to include the MLS Cup too. But yeh, that might be the best thing to do with the roster restrictions currently in place
Considering that Revs fans have a hard enough time travelling to Foxborough..... Why were there more Houston fans than Revs fans at RFK for last year's MLS Cup even tough your owner paid for busses and Boston is far closer to DC than Houston?
2008-09 CONCACAF CHAMPIONS LEAGUE Calendar of Events 2008 End July: All qualification completed, draw for preliminary round 26-28 August: Preliminary Round, First-legs 2-4 September: Preliminary Round, Second-legs Early September: Group Stage Schedule Announced 16-18 September: Group Stage - Match Day 1 23-25 September: Group Stage - Match Day 2 30 September - 2 October: Group Stage - Match Day 3 7-9 October: Group Stage - Match Day 4 21-23 October: Group Stage - Match Day 5 28-30 October: Group Stage - Match Day 6 2009 24-26 February: Quarterfinals, First-legs 3-5 March: Quarterfinals, Second-legs 17-19 March: Semifinals, First-legs 7-9 April: Semifinals, Second-legs 21-23 April: Final, First-leg 28-30 April: Final, Second-leg December: FIFA Club World Cup ^ Can't wait. If an MLS team makes it as far as the semis or finals, the four-month off season is cut to just December and January. Great for us as fans, but it will be interesting to see how teams handle the depth issues. Can we say roster expansion? I wish the final were one-leg at a neutral site, but c'est la vie. Other questions that are worth looking into...bonuses for MLS teams/players? TV coverage? I'd like to see maybe the semis and finals on ESPN2, but methinks FSC, Goltv, or even Telefutura.
"sounds like a good idea' doesn't mean it is though. Lets say for example a completely amateur side like Dallas Roma FC a few years back were to win the US Open Cup because MLS teams were mostly made up of reserves? Or even a poor semi-pro one like the current Rochester Rhinos...... Then who pays for their travel to all these games? Dallas Roma could barely pay to get to their games in the US and the Rhinos are nearly about to fold. Most USL-1 clubs outside of Miami, Montreal, Seattle and *maybe* Portland's, budgets could not take the price of international travel involved in the CONCACAF Champions Cup much less this new Champions League. Besides, your idea would cheapen the value of the Supporters Shield. The Supporters Shield and MLS Cup winners should ALWAYS be automatically seeded. If the US Open Cup winner were ever involved then it should be as a 3rd or 4th place.
Boo-hoo Canada has a play-in. As a country in CONCACAF, that's fair. Just like there are lots of lesser teams in the preliminary stage of the UEFA Champions League, there will be lesser teams in the CONCACAF qualifiers too. TFC, Montreal Impact and the Vancouver Whitecaps have already planed a mini league for 2008, with the winner declared Canadian champion. So, there's your Canadian league. It's not a very big one, thus the play-in. As a Canadian, I'm not going to apologize for our one spot. As a TFC fan, I hope that we can put a team on the pitch that can be competitive in the CL (as TFC should win the Canadian championship). Last point...moving away from Canada and TFC...With this competition now (FINALLY!) set, SuperLiga needs to be re-thought. Maybe the 5 to 8 spots should represent MLS in SuperLiga. It'sa just too much to expect the top teams to play in that exhibition too (unless there is a competitive prize associated with it).
This is going to be an insane end to the regular season for MLS teams involved in this. Schedules could look like this: Saturday, Sept. 6 - MLS wk. 24 Saturday, Sept. 13 - MLS wk. 25 Wednesday, Sept. 17 - CCL #1 Saturday, Sept. 20 - MLS wk. 26 Wednesday, Sept. 24 - CCL #2 Saturday, Sept. 27 - MLS wk. 27 Wednesday, Oct. 1 - CCL #3 Saturday, Oct. 4 - MLS wk. 28 Wednesday, Oct. 8 - CCL #4 Saturday, Oct. 11 - MLS wk. 29 Saturday, Oct. 18 - MLS wk. 30 Wednesday, Oct. 22 - CCL #5 Saturday, Oct. 25 - MLS wk. 31 Wednesday, Oct. 29 - CCL #6 Saturday, Nov. 1 - MLS Playoffs Game 1 That's a lot of games right at the end of the season. Plus teams may have some players off at World Cup Qualifiers during this time. In 2004 the U.S. played qualifiers on September 4 and 8, and October 9 and 13. I'd guess we won't see Houston, DC, New England or Chivas USA scheduled on ESPN2 in the fall. Here in Houston we might not even really get home games for our group stages matches. The University of Houston won't let us play mid-week games while school is in session. We might be traveling to other places in Texas for those three mid-week CCL "home" games.
Not to mention the Puerto Rico Islanders in USL-1 and Bermuda Hoggs FC in USL-2 can end up qualifying in the Carribbean. BTW: The prize for winning SuperLiga is $1million. Prize for winning this new Champions League?? We don't know.
it's a Univision property. I would expect a fair number of games (those not featuring FMF teams) on TeleFutura and Galavision. who knows if someone will sign up for the English-language rights to the tournament. http://www.univision.net/corp/en/pr/Miami_18122007-1.html ---- 12-18-2007 Print Univision Acquires Rights to Air Exclusive Live Spanish-Language Coverage of New Concacaf Champions League Tournament Will Broadcast 52 Matches per Year of Highly Anticipated Regional Tournament Starting In 2008 Miami, FL -- The Univision Networks announced today that they will be the exclusive Spanish-language telecasters in the United States for the annual CONCACAF Champions League, a region-wide championship for premier soccer clubs, beginning with the inaugural 2008-09 season. Twenty-four of the highest-ranked or reigning champion clubs from the Mexican Primera Division, Major League Soccer, the Costa Rican Primera Division, the Honduran Primera Division, the Guatemalan Primera Division, Salvadoran Liga Mayor, and other prominent leagues throughout CONCACAF will participate in the annual championship to determine the single best team in our continent. The format of the CONCACAF Champions League calls for qualifying round matches, round-robin group play and a knockout or elimination round. Play begins each year in August and concludes with the finals series the following April. Univision plans to televise 52 primetime matches in total each year, primarily on its TeleFutura and Galavisión Networks. “Univision is extremely happy to partner with CONCACAF to help launch this new event,” said David Downs, President of Univision Sports. “The success of this event in our market should even surpass the high standards achieved by such other continental club soccer competitions as the UEFA Champions League and South America’s Copa Libertadores. Our wonderful experience this past summer with the SuperLiga has convinced us that the competitive parity, passion and intensity of the rivalries across our region demands the creation of this event.” “CONCACAF is very excited to expand our partnership with Univision through the CONCACAF Champions League, a new and truly unique championship,” said Chuck Blazer General Secretary of CONCACAF, “The Univision Networks’ positioning in the Spanish-speaking community in the United States will ensure broad television distribution and a very positive fan experience.” ----
I don't have a problem with that (it was my idea -- you don't have to blame tab5g), as I said, even if the USOC cup winner was included, it would only be in the future that they could be given the automatic seed. Assuming (as is my hope) that the USOC would be taken more seriously at that time, and wouldn't be played by MLS sides made up of only reserve players. Not giving the USOC winner a berth at all just drives another nail into its coffin. Which is fine if we never want it to be more than second-tier tournament, but I want it to mean something eventually.
So Houston and DC will still qualify for the Champions Cup this spring, and then also be the first two reps for the Champions League come August? Kinda
When it's below zero and a wind chill of -20, NFL fans don't show up. What makes you think MLS fans would? Never heard of the concept of "synonym"?
Don't be bitter just because you: A. Can't decide which team you want to support, but just have to tell people how you're an uberfan of whoever your team of the moment is. 2. Run a Grade C Web site that a 6-year-old can fool iii. Weren't fast enough on posting the news here.
You know GTV won't get it because the Spanish rights are gone. And I bet that rules ESPN out because they would probably try to buy both and farm a lot to Deporters. So I guess it comes down to how much FSC wants it.
FSE puts FSC in the same boat as Disney/EspnDeportes and GolTV/GolTVespanol. (note, GolTV did have the English rights to Copa America 2007, and they just sent out the English commentary on both GolTV audio streams, so i suppose anything is possible.) one could guess that FSC (or perhaps even ESPN -- who knows) might at least opt for the semi-finals and Final of the 2008-09 CCL if a lot of MLS clubs are still involved. (who knows how Concacaf will be packaging or selling the English-language rights to this tournament. from reading the Univision exec's comments, it seems like the CCL wouldn't have gotten off the ground without the coverage commitment -- and rights fee -- from Univsion). ---- “Univision is extremely happy to partner with CONCACAF to help launch this new event,” said David Downs, President of Univision Sports. “The success of this event in our market should even surpass the high standards achieved by such other continental club soccer competitions as the UEFA Champions League and South America’s Copa Libertadores. Our wonderful experience this past summer with the SuperLiga has convinced us that the competitive parity, passion and intensity of the rivalries across our region demands the creation of this event.” ----
good point... but you could have made it better... just think if two MLS teams were to face off in the final, at a predetermined place such as Estadio Azteca. What would the attendance of the game be? 800 people? K
Uhhh, NFL sells out basically every game every season, they get more coverage for mini camp than MLS gets an entire season. AFC and NFC Championships were cold as hell and sold out of course so I don't know what your saying... but on point, yes, it would be stupid to have CCL/MLS games during that period. Just as stupid to make a comparison to the NFL which sells out games no matter the weather, there attendence for pre-season games beats the MLS Cup final so its stupid to even try and compare anything about the NFL to MLS on these boards. but again, I understand the point you were trying to make, just wrong comparison.
Good points. I guess I thought FSC because they and FSE seem to diverge more than the others. I guess I kind of toss ESPN out because I doubt they'd commit to the whole thing without being able to put some on Deportes and I have a funny feeling Uncle Jack will want to see the whole kit and kaboodle.
I believe he was being sarcastic and possibly even referring to the Green Bay game where the temp was below freezing but still sold out.
So should we assume that the 4 Superliga teams would be different than the 4 Concacaf Champions League teams? The preliminary rounds of the CCL would conflict with the final of the Superliga, so they would almost have to be different teams. (Last year the Superliga final was August 29, and the preliminary round of this year's CCL is listed for August 26-28.) Maybe the four teams could be LA (as defending finalists ) and the next 3 best teams, Dallas, Red Bulls, and Chicago. That gets both Beckham and Blanco into the tournament, which can only be a good thing.
Bulls**t. There were not 2,000 Houston fans at RFK. Were you even at the game? If not, then you really shouldn't be commenting on such matters.