Midday Thoughts: US Open Cup USL vs. Sounders

Well, well, well. The Richmond Kickers are the last USL Pro team left in the 2011 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup. After defeating the Dayton Dutch Lions, the Pittsburgh Riverhounds, the Columbus Crew, and Sporting KC, the Kickers will face the Chicago Fire for a chance to play the winner of Seattle/Dallas for the National Title.
So here is where I am torn.

For those of you who don't know, the Sounders are my favorite club, save the Battery. I have family out in Seattle, and have been to many Sounders games while visiting them so it seemed like a natural fit.

Hypothetically, we could have a Seattle Sounders-Richmond Kickers final. This would be my worst nightmare. Well maybe not the worst, but its up there.

Now I would always cheer for the USL against the MLS in every situation, except this. Sorry guys, but I despise the Kickers with a passion, and I love the Sounders (also with a passion). I'm all for an USL side winning the Open Cup, but I can't cheer for the Kickers, and I can't cheer against the Sounders.

Let's just wait and see what happens.

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Charleston's Road to the Cup

Hopefully we'll be hearing this chant ringing throughout Chucktown in a couple of months:

Well granted that the Battery's chances of winning this year's Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup are a lot slimmer than that of two-time defending cup champion Seattle Sounders FC, but you never know. That's what makes this tournament so much fun.

I'll start off with a little bit of history.

A non-MLS side has not won the Cup since the Rochester Rhinos won it in 1999 over the Colorado Rapids. And since that match in 1999, only one non-MLS side has been to the final, and that's the Charleston Battery.

The Battery are arguably one of the USL clubs with the most storied career in the US Open Cup. The Battery have been to one final, where they finished off the tourny with a respectable 2-1 loss to DC United at RFK Stadium. Not including that final, the Battery have advanced to two semifinals (1999 and 2004). Charleston has made it to at least the Quarterfinals every year since 2007, so expectations should be high for the Battery.

The Battery have shown that they can be giant killers as well, knocking off an impressive 9 MLS teams in the 13 years since the MLS started entering the tournament in 1996.

In last year's edition of the annual tournament, the Battery advanced to the Quarterfinals after winning their first three matches of the tournament. They defeated USASA side CASL Elite, NASL club the Carolina Railhawks, and the Chicago Fire before going out to eventual runners-up, the Columbus Crew.

What are the Battery's chances like this year? Well just as good as any of the others.

Charleston will play Regals FC in the first round on June 14th at Blackbaud Stadium. This team comes from Southern Texas and is part of the Southern Premier Soccer League and the USASA. Assuming that the Battery defeat their USASA foe and that Orlando City takes care of ASC New Stars (Another South TX team), then the Battery will face City in a second round match up. So let's say that hypothetically the Battery win this match as well. Then the Battery would face one of the eight MLS teams that have qualified for the tournament. They are:

Chicago Fire

Columbus Crew

FC Dallas

Los Angeles Galaxy

New York Red Bulls

Real Salt Lake

Seattle Sounders FC

Sporting Kansas City

After that, well its hard to tell. The goal for the Battery should be to get to the Round of 16, at least. This will require two wins. Seems simple enough, but we'll just have to wait and see.

Honestly, a lot of the MLS teams just don't take this tournament seriously, and that's a sad thing. Luckily, this allows many of the teams in the lower divisions to take advantage of the MLS teams not playing their best players or simply not playing as hard as they can.

What's at stake? Well a bid in the CONCACAF Champions League, and the winner of that tournament gets a bid in the FIFA Club World Cup. It's far off, but the Battery have a chance to be the world champions. Okay well it's a long shot, actually the longest shot of all time, but we can dream can't we?

Good luck to all the teams participating in this year's tournament, let's hope for an interesting competition.

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US Open Cup, Lamar Neagle, Charleston-Harrisburg Highlights, and More

Alright I've been silent for a while but here's a little bit of what's going on:

• Open Cup Pairings have been released. Looks like the Battery will get to face a USASA opponent in Regals FC. This team is from southern Texas and I know absolutely nothing about them; not that I would have known anything about any of the other teams, but I'll try to get as much information on them as possible. Looks like if we win that match, we'll face the ASC New Stars (another USASA team) and Orlando City. Our matches with City could end up being very, very, very important.
• Former Battery forward, Lamar Neagle, scored a cracker in the Sounders match at Real Salt Lake on Saturday night. If you didn't see the goal, here it is, plus a match recap with a short interview with Lamar. It starts around the 4 minute mark:

• Here are the highlights from Saturdays match with the Harrisburg City Islanders. I'll post a full video of the scrap with the Islanders later:



• The "More" part of the title of this article is this: I am just so ready to watch the USMNT play this summer. The friendly with Spain and then the Gold Cup will just be great.

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Lamar Neagle Goal Video, Central SC Cobras Open Tryouts, and No NASL Teams in the Open Cup?

Okay so if everyone has settled down about this whole NASL-teams-not-in-the-US-Open-Cup thing, let me explain to you why: You can't create controversy and then expect to be rewarded for it.

Now I like the NASL, I like the teams, I like the fans, I like the friendly rivalry it creates with the USL, but you can't cause all of this controversy and expect the USSF to say, "Hey the NASL has been such a problem, but let's let them participate in the one thing we can hold over their heads to make them do what we want anyway." Now if you understood the message being conveyed in that run-on sentence, you should understand that the USSF is dealing with the NASL like they would a child. They're shaking their finger in the NASL's face and saying bad boy. You don't give your child a lollipop right after they have done something bad right? But it is the right thing to do. I'm not saying it best for the growth of soccer right now, but in the long term it will have been the right decision. If they had not punished the NASL, this could lead to the leagues having more power than the federation, which is definitely not a situation we want to find ourselves in.

In the NASL's defense, they did not punish the USL for the whole ordeal went on last year, but then again it wasn't as much of the leagues' faults as it was the teams that left the USL. And also the USSF did "provisionally sanction" the NASL for this season. For those that don't know about the controversy last year between the NASL and USL here's a summary from Wikipedia:

"The USL has issued several press releases questioning the legality of the teams choosing to break away, suggesting that litigation to protect its interests and those of the USL-1 teams from any breach of contract is imminent.^[19] The USL has also claimed that the NASL and the TOA ownership group "is tortuously [Sic] interfering with USL-1 team owners that are contractually obligated to participate in the 2010 season" and "has made several misleading statements in a variety of press releases to taint the reputation of USL and its long history of developing the sport of soccer in the United States and Canada".^[20]

The NASL disagrees with the USL assessment, and the USL has not filed suit against the new league as a whole. The USL sued three of the constituent teams (Crystal Palace Baltimore, Tampa Bay, and Rochester) for breach of contract, claiming that the teams had committed to playing in USL in 2010.^[21][22] However on December 21, 2009 the suits were dropped in favor of binding arbitration.^[23]

In January 2010, after announcing that it would not sanction either the NASL or the USL First Division for 2010, the USSF announced that it would be running a second-tier league in 2010, putting the NASL on hold for at least a year. The USSF Division 2 Professional League includes teams from both the NASL and USL-1.

Controversy has continued to surround both the NASL and the USL through the 2010 temporary USSF D-2 Pro League season and in the lead up a 2011 compromise on Tier 2 and Tier 3 soccer in the United States, as the leagues have fought for the loyalty of various clubs. Most recently, USL's Puerto Rico Islanders joined NASL, while a founding member of the NASL, the Rochester Rhinos, returned to the USL in October."

Well now that my rant is over, on to some news:

In one of my posts a couple of days ago, I mentioned that former Charleston Battery player, Lamar Neagle, scored a goal in a scrimmage with Real Salt Lake. Here's a recap of the match, and the goal that Lamar scored is included.

Today Central SC Cobras FC held open tryouts, and also announced that their first practice will be held on March 1st, and that more open tryouts are to come. After all of the open tryouts, a list of players who have accepted roster spots will be announced.

Sorry about the rant today guys, but what do you think about the NASL not being allowed to play in the Open Cup? Leave a comment in the comment section below.

If you need to contact me, you can by e-mailing me at SCSoccerblog@gmail.com.

Charleston Battery: US Open Cup, Charlie Davies Visiting Charleston, and More

Besides the upcoming USL Pro season, the Battery have the Carolina Challenge Cup in early March, a pair of mid-season matches against local colleges in mid-March, and now the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup to play.

Today it was announced that the Battery's first round match in the US Open Cup will be against a team that qualifies for the tournament from the  USASA (United States Adult Soccer Association). The Battery will play at home on June 14th against one of these teams. The tournament will consist of 40 teams; 8 from the MLS (6 automatic bids, and 2 for the winners of a 10 team playoff), the 11 U.S. based USL Pro teams, 9 from the PDL, and 12 from the USASA. Seattle Sounders FC will be the returning champs and are going for their 3rd straight US Open Cup championship.

The Battery have had success in the US Open Cup (see the 2008 tournament), as well as against MLS teams. Last year the Battery got to the quarterfinals, with wins over the USASA's Capital Area Soccer League Elite (CASL Elite), the USSF D2's Carolina Railhawks (who happen to share a stadium), and the MLS' Chicago Fire on PK's, before losing to the Columbus Crew. The two games against the CASL Elite and Carolina Railhawks were played at Blackbaud Stadium while the two games against Major League Soccer teams were played away.

The US Open Cup is my favorite part about soccer in the United States, due to its similarity to the FA Cup, and I'm excited as always to the see the Battery playing in this great tournament. Hopefully we'll see good first and second round match-ups so we can face an MLS side in the round of 16 like last year. The Carolina Challenge Cup could give us a look to future matches in the US Open Cup. Toronto FC can't play in the US Open Cup because, well they're a Canadian team. DC United and Chicago Fire are not automatic qualifiers for the Cup, but are playing for 2 of the berths, and with the addition of Charlie Davies, DC should have no problem qualifying.

Speaking of Charlie Davies, we're gonna be seeing him in the Carolina Challenge Cup! A couple of days ago it became official that Davies will be playing for United next year. I can't begin to explain how excited I am about DC signing Davies. Though having USMNT players playing against the best over in Europe is great, it's also nice to be able to see them play here in the US, and when they're coming to Charleston, that quadruples the excitement.

On the women's side, the Central SC Cobras have been very busy. This Saturday, the Cobras will be holding an open tryout from 9:00-4:00 at North Springs Park in Columbia. Good luck to all that will be trying out, and hopefully in a while they'll be competing for a W-League championship. They also have been releasing videos on a YouTube page called OPP2434. Make sure to check that out as well as this page where they are selling shirts, and keep giving support to the Cobras as they make the transition into the W-League.

Also check out this article on The Shin Guardian. The article talks about the possibility of an MLS expansion team in the Southeast.

If you have any questions or if you need to contact me, you can e-mail me at SCSoccerblog@gmail.com.

Why Soccer is Going in the Right Direction in the United States

Well as I've been watching Fox Soccer Channel's coverage of the FA Cup, I came to thinking: The United States format of soccer is actually similar to England's. Obviously, the clubs in England have a chance to play for many trophies a year, (FA Cup, Carling Cup, UEFA Champions League, etc.) but the US Open Cup and CONCACAF Champions League has been making the United States soccer more European, year after year.

Now, I have talked about how we need to Americanize soccer, but in this situation, I'll make an exception, because we need to have multiple pieces of hardware to play for every year. That's what I think makes soccer so great in Europe, you always have something to play for. Whether it is to escape relegation, win a cup, or win the UEFA Champions League, the teams in England are always playing hard. Its also exciting for the clubs, hardcore fans, and casual watchers when a small club from the Football Leagues draw a mastodon like Chelsea or Manchester United.

You can see the similarities when the USL clubs draw the MLS sides in the US Open Cup. Though it is always exciting to see two MLS teams duke it out for the trophy, it's always nice to see a USL squad play an MLS team in a "David vs. Goliath" type scenario. We saw this in 2008 when the Charleston Battery played DC United in a rendition of the Coffee Pot Cup and the US Open Cup championship game. Though the Battery didn't win the match (they lost 2-1) they put up a good fight, and it was good for the fans to see their team compete for a big cup.

This extra excitement that is found in soccer is not found in the other professional sports in America. In the NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL you play for one championship every year. You also see teams in the later stages of the season not play hard, because they are out of contention to win anything. Now while this can happen in soccer in some situations, when you are playing for 3 or 4 trophies every year, you can keep it exciting, and keep more clubs afloat.

What I want to see in the future, is a relegation system. It is far off, but the relegation system could work in the United States once the USL and MLS develop a little further. Undoubtedly the MLS has gotten good attendance figures, but if the USL can get each club up to 10,000-15,000 average attendance, then there is a good chance that the relegation system used in England, could work here. Just imagine, "MLS in Charleston" it just sounds good.

To finish this long rambling off, let me say this: English Soccer fans can't talk down to the MLS for attendance, quality of play, or coverage of the sport in the United States, because seriously the MLS has been around for 13 years. I would like to see the English soccer attendance numbers from 1901.