Flash forward to last night, with USL First Division side Puerto Rico Islanders taking a 2-1 lead into San Pedro Sula, against Marathon of Honduras. Playing a strategic match and looking to save their lead, DC United castoff Nicholas Adderly struck at the death, helping Puerto Rico to a 1-0 result and 3-1 aggregate victory. Tonight the Montreal Impact (also of the USL First Division) go into the 2nd leg with Santos Laguna of Mexico with a 2-0 lead. 
One question I've been asked is how did these two teams qualify? Puerto Rico qualified as a Carribean team and Montreal had already superseded an MLS team in Toronto FC during Canadian qualification for this tournament.
One Upped
Forget the fact that MLS was given 4 spots in the tournament which began in August. The only other country that gets as many spots is Mexico. Two teams, New England Revolution and Chivas had to go through a home and home qualifying round, which neither made it out of. New England lost to Joe Public of Trinidad & Tobago with a disgraceful 6-1 aggregate result, while Chivas fell to Tauro FC of Panama 3-1. DC United, who qualified directly to the group stage as the 2007 Supporters Shield winner, became the whipping boys of their group, only taking 1 point from 6 matches. Houston barely even qualified for the knock out stages, need a 1-0 result on the last day of the group stage to move on.
The case has been made that all 4 MLS teams did take part in the North American SuperLiga, which the Revolution actually won, but were worn out when the CONCACAF Champions League started a month later. The problem is both Atlante (just beat Houston) and Santos Laguna (match tonight vs. Montreal) participated in that tournament as well and both teams have played roughly the same amount of games over the past year.
MLS clubs haven't won a CONCACAF tournament since the home-and-away format was adopted in 2002. Their performances have previously been excused because the tournament has been held mainly during the MLS preseason and teams aren't in top form yet. This argument no longer works because USL teams play nearly the exact same schedule as their counterparts in MLS. There is no longer an excuse.
Forget the fact that MLS was given 4 spots in the tournament which began in August. The only other country that gets as many spots is Mexico. Two teams, New England Revolution and Chivas had to go through a home and home qualifying round, which neither made it out of. New England lost to Joe Public of Trinidad & Tobago with a disgraceful 6-1 aggregate result, while Chivas fell to Tauro FC of Panama 3-1. DC United, who qualified directly to the group stage as the 2007 Supporters Shield winner, became the whipping boys of their group, only taking 1 point from 6 matches. Houston barely even qualified for the knock out stages, need a 1-0 result on the last day of the group stage to move on.
The case has been made that all 4 MLS teams did take part in the North American SuperLiga, which the Revolution actually won, but were worn out when the CONCACAF Champions League started a month later. The problem is both Atlante (just beat Houston) and Santos Laguna (match tonight vs. Montreal) participated in that tournament as well and both teams have played roughly the same amount of games over the past year.MLS clubs haven't won a CONCACAF tournament since the home-and-away format was adopted in 2002. Their performances have previously been excused because the tournament has been held mainly during the MLS preseason and teams aren't in top form yet. This argument no longer works because USL teams play nearly the exact same schedule as their counterparts in MLS. There is no longer an excuse.
Puerto Rico and Montreal's payroll are smaller than any team in MLS, in fact any team in the Mexican top flight, yet one is in the Champions League semifinal while the other is on the cusp of being there. These teams both have players that supposedly couldn't hack it in top flight American soccer, but are now outperforming the teams they couldn't run with. MLS should already be EMBARRASSED for being one-upped by the second tier league in its own country, but if Montreal comes away victorious tonight in Torreon, the league will have serious egg on its face.
The CONCACAF Champions League is far more important that Major League Soccer’s SuperLiga, for which the league rewards Mexican teams more money for winning than their own. On the other hand, the winner of the Champions League has a berth in the FIFA World Club Cup (where just participating earns a team $500,000), for which no MLS club has been able to qualify. Participation in the FIFA tournament would go much further to earn MLS the respect it so badly craves. It doesn’t come from winning your own made-for-TV cash grab or signing a major superstar on his last legs.
Going forward, I'd be worried Major League Soccer clubs will begin to lose their allocated spots in the Champions League if they don't perform better in the future. It is up to MLS to make this tournament what it should be, not make it second fiddle to something that means so little.
Until that time, Up the USL!
2 comments:
IMHO MLS (the US based teams, more on TFC later) poor showing is directly related to a tendency for MLS teams to not take non-league competitions like US Open Cup seriously. In the past it didn't really matter so much if a team won or lost these competitions. However now with the changes in CONCACAF Champions League, there is a value in winning (slot in World Club Cup).
As for TFC, TFC both underestimated the USL teams in the inaugaral Canadian qualifying competition and was also suffering from some significant injury issues at the time of the competition. This year will be different.
Don't get me wrong, I think it's great that PR and Montreal are doing so well in the CCL. However, I think it's a little premature to just take away MLS spots in the CCL. For one, this is the first year of this format. Before CCL, it was the CONCACAF Champions Cup, and MLS teams were routinely in the semifinals in that format (yes, it started at the quarters most years, but still a feat nonetheless. DC United and LA Galaxy have also won 1 CCC each, with LA also being a runner-up in '97. So, MLS traditionally has a history of success in the old format of the CCC, but as this is the first year of Champions League, we should reserve judgment for down the road when it's more established and we can look at the patterns of success between various leagues.
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