What the Heck is Leagues Cup?

The Leagues Cup has been around since 2019, but a lot of soccer fans in North America still aren’t too familiar with it. It began as an eight-team, single-elimination tournament with four clubs each from Major League Soccer and Liga MX. It has changed formats over the last few years, with 2023 featuring every team in both leagues and a group stage prior to the knockout rounds.

The 2019 tournament featured two Liga MX finalists, with Cruz Azul defeating Tigres, 2-1 in Las Vegas to capture the title. The 2020 event was supposed to double the number of teams, but it was canceled due to the pandemic.

In 2021, Orlando City participated in the tournament for the first time. The format reverted to four teams from each of the two leagues again, with Sporting Kansas City, New York City FC, and the Seattle Sounders also participating from MLS. The Sounders became the first MLS team to reach the final but Liga MX’s Club Leon won it, 3-2.

The Lions, as you may recall, were eliminated in the quarterfinals after a controversial 1-0 home loss to Santos Laguna. Orlando City players felt that Antonio Carlos was fouled on the buildup to the game’s only goal. Junior Urso was shown a straight red after the match and would theoretically be suspended for Friday’s game against Houston if he was still a Lion (or, no, probably he would have served his ban in Champions League against Tigres, but I digress). [UPDATE: Well, look at that Junior *is* a Lion once again…the club is double-checking his Leagues Cup eligibility.]

Rather than a tournament, Leagues Cup presented a showcase of five matches in 2022. This was due to fixture congestion due to the FIFA World Cup that year and was to become a preview for an expanded 2023 tournament, which begins this weekend. Five MLS teams and three Liga MX teams participated in the showcase, with the following results:

• The LA Galaxy defeated Guadalajara 2-0 at SoFi Stadium.
• Club America drew LAFC 0-0 and won a postgame penalty shootout 6-5 — also at SoFi Stadium.
• FC Cincinnati defeated Guadala 3-1 at TQL Stadium.
• Nashville SC drew Club America 3-3 and then defeated the Liga MX side 4-2 in penalties at Geodis Park.
• Atlas defeated Real Salt Lake 2-1 at America First Field.

The 2023 Iteration of Leagues Cup

The 2023 inter-league tournament starts Friday and runs through Aug. 19, with 77 matches scheduled in all. The entire tournament will take place in the MLS footprint — either in the U.S. or Canada. It is an officially sanctioned Concacaf event, organized through the cooperation of Major League Soccer and the Mexican Football Federation.

Every team in MLS and Liga MX will participate, with 2022 MLS champion LAFC and 2022 Liga MX Aperatura and Clausura aggregate top point getter Pachuca each getting byes past the group stage. They will begin the tournament in the Round of 32. This tournament will qualify three teams for the 2024 Concacaf Champions Cup (formerly Concacaf Champions League). The two finalists and the third-place team from the 2023 Leagues Cup will qualify and the winner will get placed in the Round of 16 of next year’s Concacaf Champions Cup.

The groups will play in four regions: West, Central, South, and East. Each region includes multiple groups — with each group consisting of three teams that will play each other in a round-robin format. There are three groups in the West, four in the Central, Four in the South, and Four in the East. The top two teams in each group advance to the knockoug stages, which begin in the Round of 32, which will be held Aug. 2-4. The Round of 16 will take place Aug. 6-8, the quarterfinals Aug. 11-12, the semifinals on Aug. 15, and the final and third-place playoff on Aug. 19.

Orlando City was drawn into group South 2 along with the Houston Dynamo and Santos Laguna. The Lions will host Houston on Friday and Santos Laguna on Saturday, July 29 at Exploria Stadium. Houston will host Santos Laguna on July 25 at Shell Energy Stadium.

Points System and Rules

As is the case in normal league games, the winner of each group stage match gets three points in the standings. The loser gets zero points. If two teams play to a draw, there is a penalty shootout after the match — much like the current league setup for MLS NEXT Pro. The shootout determines which of the two teams will get an extra point in the standings.

The games will use video assistant referees, so critical plays can be upheld or overturned. As is the case everywhere, that doesn’t mean video replay will be used correctly or in a way that makes anyone happy. Referees in this tournament will come from the FMF, the Professional Referee Organization (PRO) and Concacaf. 

Leagues Cup will not have a foreign players rule like U.S. Open Cup does, or as per Liga MX requirements.

Orlando City’s Path

If Orlando City can finish either first or second in group South 2, the Lions would get to advance to the knockout stages. The group’s second-place team will have to face Pachuca in the Round of 32, while the winner of South 2 will face the winner of South 3 — a group that consists of Inter Miami, Cruz Azul, and Atlanta United. Either way, the teams that get out of South 2 are in Pachuca’s corner of the bracket.

If the Lions were to advance to the Round of 16, the choices branch out. If Orlando City wins the group and then beats the South 3 winner, it would face the victor between the South 1 winner (Austin FC, Mazatlan, or Juarez) or the South 4 runner-up (FC Dallas, Necaxa, or Charlotte FC).

I refuse to do any permutations beyond that, but advancing to the quarterfinals would likely mean a match against Pachuca (if Orlando wins South 2) or…well, one of the other teams from one of the South region groups.

The above gives the basics of what the Leagues Cup is. It doesn’t give the ‘Why?’ but the answer to those kinds of questions is usually ‘Because money,’ isn’t it?