FC Cincinnati draw New York City FC, Club Querétaro in Leagues Cup 2024 Group Stage

FC Cincinnati learned today that New York City FC and Club Querétaro have been drawn as opponents in the Orange and Blue’s Leagues Cup 2024 group, East 1, as part of Major League Soccer (MLS), Liga MX and Concacaf’s announcement of the format and groups for Leagues Cup 2024. 

Tickets for home group stage games for FC Cincinnati in Leagues Cup 2024 will go on sale when the schedule and bracket is announced at a later date.

Leagues Cup 2024, the second edition of the international soccer competition featuring all 47 clubs from Canada, Mexico, and the United States, will unfold from July 26 to August 25, 2024 and will crown a winner among MLS and Liga MX clubs. It will also decide three qualifiers for the 2025 Concacaf Champions Cup and an opportunity to earn a spot in the FIFA Club World Cup. 

Last season, FC Cincinnati won their group over Sporting Kansas City and Chivas Guadalajara to advance to the Round of 32, where the club fell in a penalty kick shoutout to eventual tournament runners-up Nashville SC.

Leagues Cup 2024 Format 
Moving forward, the tournament will introduce a tiered Leagues Cup Ranking system, as well as hubs for the highest-ranked Liga MX clubs. The Leagues Cup ranking will be strictly based on combined MLS and Liga MX club performance based on points in the last 34 regular season matches. MLS teams will be ranked based on the 2023 MLS Supporters’ Shield standings, while Liga MX clubs will be ranked based on the cumulative 34 matches in the 2023 Clausura and Apertura tournaments. 
 
All participating clubs – except the two Leagues’ champions - are divided into three tiers based on the Leagues Cup Ranking (1-15, 16-30, 31-45), forming 15 groups of three clubs each, one club from each tier, prioritizing geographical and competitive balance among the 45 clubs. For 2024, Leagues Cup will be played in two regions, East and West, with seven groups in the East and eight groups in the West, regionalizing travel for all participating clubs. Like the 2023 format, both Liga MX and MLS Cup champions, Club América and Columbus Crew respectively, receive an automatic bye to the Round of 32. The two champions are not included in the Leagues Cup Ranking.

The Liga MX Champion and the three top-ranked Liga MX clubs will be granted hub privileges. The hub privileges, which will minimize Liga MX club travel and reward them by playing in pre-determined venues as the home team, are based on the Leagues Cup Ranking. Club America (League champion with a bye) will have hosting privileges through the semifinals, C.F. Monterrey (No. 1 rank) through Round of 16, Chivas Guadalajara (No. 4 rank) through Round of 32, and Tigres (No. 6 rank) throughout the Group Stage, rewarding the clubs according to their 2023 Apertura and Clausura performances.

Liga MX clubs with hub privileges will play at venues to be announced alongside the Leagues Cup 2024 schedule and bracket at a later date. 

This new format, based on the Leagues Cup Ranking, was a joint collaborative effort of the Leagues Cup Committee, comprising representatives from Leagues Cup, and both MLS and LIGA MX leadership. Considerations included rewarding regular season results and geographical regions while addressing learnings from 2023. 

Knockout Rounds: Following the Group Stage, the advancing 30 teams will be joined by LIGA MX and MLS cup champions (Columbus Crew and Club América, respectively) and will be placed in a fixed bracket to compete in the single-game elimination Knockout Rounds beginning with the Round of 32 (16 matches), followed by Round of 16 (eight matches). The eight advancing teams will compete in the Quarterfinals (four matches) before the two Semifinal matches. Leagues Cup 2024 Third Place and Final will determine the three Concacaf Champions Cup qualified clubs.

No Ties: Leagues Cup will maintain its current No Ties format. Each team receives one point if the game is tied after 90 minutes. The winner of the subsequent penalty shootout will earn an additional point. Regulation wins count as three points, with games being decided by penalty kick in case of regular time draw.

Fans in over 100 countries and regions will be able to watch all 77 Leagues Cup matches on MLS Season Pass on the Apple TV app, the subscription service from Apple and Major League Soccer that is available on smart TVs, streaming devices, Apple devices, set-top boxes, game consoles, and the web at tv.apple.com. In addition, TelevisaUnivision, TV Azteca, FOX Sports (FS1), TSN and RDS will be the linear broadcast home for selected group stage matches in Mexico, United States and Canada. 

ABOUT LEAGUES CUP
Leagues Cup represents a monumental new chapter for North American soccer. Starting in 2023, Major League Soccer and LIGA MX will continue to pause their seasons each summer and all 47 first division professional soccer clubs in the U.S., Mexico and Canada will compete in a World Cup-style, official Concacaf tournament, which will qualify the top three finishers to the Concacaf Champions Cup. In 2023, MLS’ Inter Miami CF became the first-ever Leagues Cup champion. 

Leagues Cup 2024 will kick off Friday, July 26 and will feature 77 games hosted at stadiums throughout the U.S. and Canada, with the Final taking place on Sunday, August 25. Fans in over 100 countries and regions will be able to watch Leagues Cup on MLS Season Pass on the Apple TV app, which is available on Apple devices, smart TVs, streaming devices from Roku, Amazon, and Google, game consoles, and the web at tv.apple.com. In addition, TV Azteca, TelevisaUnivision, FOX Sports, TSN and RDS will be the linear broadcast home for select Leagues Cup matches in the United States, Mexico and Canada.