Write On Sports LLC - "CONCACAF Champions Cup: Where Does MLS Fit?" by Jeff Bull

CONCACAF Champions Cup: Where Does MLS Fit?

2007-02-20 02:03:22 | By: Jeff Bull

Start with what you know - or can discover without fighting Google all night, anyway: the United States has qualified for the past five World Cups; over the same period, Costa Rica has qualified for three; Trinidad & Tobago brought their island nation to its feet by qualifying for the first time in 2006. Honduras, for its part, last qualified for the World Cup in 1982. Guatemala has never made it to soccer’s biggest event; endless, brutal civil wars do that to a country. Mexico, of course, qualifies for the World Cup like people breathe: it just happens and is generally expected to continue happening.

Now, what do the comparative successes of these national teams tell one about the CONCACAF Champions Cup, the regional competition involving professional clubs from all those countries? More than one might think, actually. For instance, given the above, one would expect Mexican clubs to dominate these tournaments - and they have. By the same logic, one would also expect Costa Rican clubs to fare tolerably as well. History bears out both statements: since 1962, a Mexican club has won the tournament literally half the time (21 times out of a possible 42); Costa Rica has won six times, most of them after 1990, right around when they started making appearances in the World Cup. A trip back through the archives show that even Guatemalan and Trinidadian clubs have corralled the title of best club in the CONCACAF region.

The United States has won as well - though, not nearly as often as one might think. In the years since becoming a respected soccer nation - a slow, steady climb lasting roughly 1990 to the present - the United States has won the CONCACAF Champions Cup two times: DC United lifted the trophy in 1998 and the Los Angeles Galaxy in 2000. While it’s an open question as to whether or not Major League Soccer (MLS) has improved, that an American club team hasn’t won the trophy in six years says something. The question is what?

It’s not that MLS clubs have embarrassed themselves in the Champions Cup - 2006 excepted, when both the New England Revolution and the Los Angeles Galaxy crashed out after the first round. Overall, though, the record from 1997 through 2005 shows MLS teams reaching the semifinals more often than not. Still, it’s worth pointing out that the Galaxy’s 2000 win was the last time an MLS club featured in the final for the competition. And it has been nothing BUT Costa Rican and Mexican clubs over that entire period, a reality that suggests those countries boast the best club teams in the CONCACAF region.

2007 is another year and, of course, another opportunity for MLS clubs: specifically, the Houston Dynamo, last year’s MLS Cup winners, and DC United, who won last year’s Supporters’ Shield by compiling the best regular season record. How do things look for this year’s MLS delegation? That’s another hard question to answer and it’s one that requires a little background.

Since 2004, the qualifying rounds of previous few years were discarded to make way for an eight-team tournament. Under current rules, which, according to a Wikipedia entry, are slated to change by 2009, slots are distributed among the member federations by the following formula: two to Mexico, two to MLS, three to Central American clubs, and one to Caribbean clubs. Rather than play a round-robin format, as happens during the opening rounds of the World Cup, the CONCACAF Champions Cup features home-and-home legs between teams paired in brackets.

For the past several years, MLS clubs have entered the competition at the quarterfinal stage. The upside of this - e.g. avoiding qualifying rounds in the deeper backwaters of Central America and the Caribbean - is arguably erased by the fact that, since 2000, this competition has started during MLS’s preseason. This means they hit the tournament cold with players a couple steps shy of general, never mind, match fitness. Worse, the teams they play from Costa Rica, Mexico, Honduras, and elsewhere are smack in the middle of their seasons and their players at the peak of fitness and on-field synchronicity. This constitutes one of the more persistent gripes/excuses from MLS players and managers, but a look back at the league’s recent record, where American clubs have reached the semifinals three out of the past five years, suggests another problem.

Until 2004, it seems fair to dub that “other problem” the Mexican clubs. In earlier rounds of the competition for the 2002-2003 series, MLS clubs fared well against teams from Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras; it wasn’t until the semifinals, where they faced Mexican clubs, that MLS clubs fell out of the tournament; whether it was Monarcos Morelia, CD Necaxa, Pachuca, or UNAM Pumas, these clubs had a habit of knocking off MLS clubs - not infrequently by large margins. But the 2004 tournament witnessed a shift, one signaled by two Costa Rican clubs - CD Alajuelense and Deportivo Saprissa - playing in the final.

Since that, apparently, seminal year Costa Rican clubs have been the bane of MLS clubs: in 2004, Saprissa knocked the Chicago Fire out in the semis, while Alajuelense tossed out the former San Jose Earthquakes in the quarterfinals; 2005 saw Alajuelense strike again, this time against the Kansas City Wizards; and the same two clubs struck again last season when Alajuelense toppled the Revolution and Saprissa the Galaxy.

That background, assuming it means anything, gives DC United fans cause for optimism heading into the first leg in their quarterfinal home-and home series tomorrow (9 p.m. EST on Fox Soccer Channel). They’ll play CD Olimpia, a Honduran club team. The Houston Dynamo, on the other hand, faces a quarterfinal tie against Puntarenas FC, a club from the always-tricky Costa Rican league (2:30 p.m. EST, Fox Soccer Channel). While the first leg of a series means plenty for the second leg, American fans won’t know whether the Costa Rican curse will strike again - or whether there’s a new Honduran curse to fear - until the second legs wrap up on March 1.

History and popular mythology aside, it’s difficult to make an apples-to-apples comparison between MLS clubs and their Central American counterparts. It’s true, for instance, that one can find where both Olimpia and Puntarenas currently sit in their domestic competitions. But even if one knows that Olimpia currently resides at a lowly sixth in the Honduran first division’s Clausura, while Puntarenas is riding high at second in Group B of the Costa Rican first division, it’s nearly impossible to translate their respective statuses to MLS. In other words, that history is all we’ve got to go by really.

More significantly, it’s tempting to review our recent World Cup history and regard Honduran and Costa Rican club teams as speed bumps on MLS’s rise to world relevance or, God forbid, world prominence. To be blunt about it, Costa Rica and Honduras are, on the international stage, pissant little countries, while many view the U.S. as a rising power; this summer’s SuperLiga tournament is, arguably, a snub, a way of saying clubs from those tiny countries don’t really matter. But we’re currently stuck in our little soccer world cul-de-sac behind those same clubs from those pissant countries. What does that say about MLS?

The time for MLS clubs to start beating their Costa Rican peers is now - or, more precisely, today.

Comments

Jeff Bull commented,
UPDATE: For the record, the Houston Dynamo narrowly lost the first leg of their Champions Cup series against Puntarenas FC through a late, late goal. DC United, however, pounded CD Olimpia 4-1 away from home, a very impressive game. Anyone interested in finding out more can find links upon links to commentary all over the Web through should visit my site, which can be accessed by clicking first on my byline ("Jeff Bull" at the top of the page) and then by clicking the link to the site that appears on the following page.
February 22, 2007 4:01 p.m.

Jeff Bull commented,
Whoops. You're looking for the post titled, "CONCACAF Champs' Cup: What We All Saw" (http://itsasimplegame.blogspot.com/2007/02/concacaf-champs-cup-what-all-saw.html#links).
February 22, 2007 4:02 p.m.

Comments

Post a comment