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Concacaf, MLS and Liga MX unveiled a new club competition structure on Tuesday afternoon that will reshape professional men’s football in the region and particularly in the United States, Canada and Mexico.
The revised Concacaf Champions League format and the expanded and inclusive League Cup tournament, which will feature all MLS and Liga MX teams, replace the previous overhaul unveiled in early February. The modified competitions will begin in 2023-24.
The current CCL is a 16-team competition, in brackets. It was supposed to make way for a massive 50-team event in fall 2023 that would start with 10 regionalized groups, four of which spanned all three North American nations. But that plan has now been scrapped in favor of a more streamlined, bracketed 27-club tournament featuring 18 North American entrants that will be played for the first time in spring 2024.
“The fans want to see knockout situations,” Concacaf president Victor Montagliani said on Tuesday.
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MLS will provide five US-based teams based on league results, and a sixth US team will qualify through the US Open Cup. La Liga MX will send six clubs, and there will now be three offers awarded to Canadian teams – one through the Canadian Championship and two through the Canadian Premier League. Three additional places will then be allocated to the first three of the enlarged Leagues Cup, the MLS-Liga MX tournament which, from 2023, will involve the 47 members of the two best national circuits in the region.
Launched in 2019 as part of the competitive partnership between MLS and Liga MX, the Leagues Cup has been a disappointing eight-team knockout event with inconsistent qualifying criteria and low stakes. The 2021 edition, its second after last year’s cancellation, will end with Wednesday night’s final between the Seattle Sounders and Club León.
In 2023, however, it will experience exponential growth and become a fixture on the North American calendar. MLS and Liga MX will be putting their campaigns on hold from late July / early August so that all 47 members (48 once MLS reaches 30 clubs) can focus on the Leagues Cup.
Kelvin Kuo / USA TODAY Sports
There are still several details unknown, but it is understood that the new League Cup format will include a group stage followed by knockout rounds (possibly 16 groups of three feeding into a 32 knockout round), with prize money increasing as the competition progresses. It will continue to play in the United States and Canada, at least in the short term, and will qualify three clubs for the new CCL. Among the unannounced or unresolved issues: It is unclear how the Cup will be ranked / ranked, whether there will be a third-place game or how the eliminated teams will spend the remainder of the League Cup break.
“It’s a much more authentic and official format,” said MLS commissioner Don Garber.
The reigning MLS Cup winner will continue to play their La Liga MX counterpart in the one-off Campeones Cup (the Columbus Crew and Cruz Azul teams will take place this year on September 29), and the MLS teams will also continue to compete in the ‘US Open Cup, which will resume in 2022 after a two-year hiatus.
The remainder of the 27-team squad of the CLC will be made up of clubs from Central America and the Caribbean. A new Central American tournament will provide six clubs and three more will reserve the Caribbean passage. Five teams – MLS, Liga MX (one of two crowned each year), Leagues Cup, Central American and Caribbean champions – will receive CCL knockout stages . The other 22 will play a return match. opening round.
CCL 2022 and 2023 will be played as traditional 16-team events featuring four US-based MLS teams yet to be determined as well as the winner of the Canadian Championship. The 2021 edition will be decided by Club América and will host Monterrey on October 28.
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