Most soccer fans on this side of the U.S.-Mexico border forgot about the CONCACAF Champions League the moment the last U.S. team was eliminated. That was the Galaxy, tossed aside by a team from Canada, which itself would soon be taken behind the barn and put out of its regional misery.
Actually, check all that.
Most soccer fans on this side of the U.S.-Mexico border couldn’t tell you a thing about the CONCACAF Champions League unless you handed them a laptop, reminded them about Wikipedia and told them what that ridiculous acronym stood for.
The CONCACAF Champions League may one day gain a modicum of prominence in the American sports scene – or at the very least, in the domestic soccer scene. A good first step would be for a U.S. club to finally qualify for the FIFA Club World Cup – which is the big pot of media gold at the end of the CONCACAF Champions League rainbow.
Then, as people from this land got engaged in the annual FIFA event, they might be inclined to row backward to investigate the qualifying tournament, which would add a greater awareness and sense of importance to Champions League goings-on.
Alas, that won’t be for another year. At very least.
Today, we do know who will represent the region in this year’s FIFA Club World Cup. It’s Monterrey from Mexico, making its second consecutive appearance.
Monterrey rebuffed Santos Laguna’s challenge in last night’s tournament finale.
So Santos, the team that eliminated two Major League Soccer teams in the knockout stage (Seattle Sounders and Toronto FC), won’t go to Asia this December.
And neither will Herculez Gomez, Santos’ U.S. international striker, who is having such a great spring in Mexico.
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- footballer4ever - Apr 26, 2012 at 10:53 AM
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The time will come when Mexico will be the one having issues going to the world club. It’s barely our 17th season and our roots are stablished firmly; by contrast, the mexican league in concerned and even got the premier league creator for ideas to improve their league as if they know it’s only a matter of time for MLS to take away the spotlight from them. In the end, i don’t see many high profile players fighting to go over and play in Mexico, but prefer the young and promising MLS league.
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- tylerbetts - Apr 26, 2012 at 11:20 AM
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I think the biggest thing holding this tournament back from being more popular in the US is that most people in the US like to follow things the US wins at. Michael Phelps? We love watching him. Olympic Basketball? We love watching it. Downhill skiing? We love watching it. The Biathalon? Not so much. But, we’d enjoy watching it (and watch more of it), if we had a legitimate gold medal contender.
For me, I love the CCL. It’s part of what got me hooked on domestic soccer. The thought of playing meaningful games against teams from other countries was compelling to me. I had just moved to Columbus, hadn’t found my soccer love yet, but was reading a small article in the Paper about the Crew’s game at Toluca, and I was hooked. I had to find out more about this competition. And, as I talk to people starting to get into soccer or who ask me about my love of soccer, I talk to them about CCL, and they always have a genuine, interested, “that’s cool” kind of response to it. We just need our teams to 1) win it and 2) market it better.
As to the game, while I was disappointed by a Mexico-Mexico final, I’m doubly disappointed that Herc won’t be going to the Club World Cup. Santos was the lesser of two evils for me, and, alas, they lost.
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- footballer4ever - Apr 26, 2012 at 11:29 AM
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@ tylerbetts- another football convert fan, welcome to the beautiful game fanclub! (smile).
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- slxc - Apr 27, 2012 at 11:37 AM
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that hurts.
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