As the confetti fell around Darlington Nagbe, Cucho Hernandez and the rest of the Columbus Crew, the curtain also came down on the 2024 edition of Leagues Cup. The trophy was lifted, the Concacaf Champions Cup spots were won, and everyone turned their focus back to league play. After all, the Crew and fourth-place finisher Philadelphia Union would square off in a conference game just three days later.
But what was this edition of Leagues Cup? What does the 2024 version of the competition leave us with?
We headed into the tournament wondering if it was an opportunity for revenge. Armed with the knowledge their travel would be lessened thanks to the hub sites awarded to Liga MX’s four strongest teams, many of Mexico’s top clubs set their sights on a top-three finish. Instead, none of the Liga MX clubs made it into the semifinals, one fewer than last year.
That’s not to say there weren’t good showings from Mexican clubs. Club América and Mazatlán both pushed their quarterfinal opponents all the way to penalties before falling just short of the final four. Toluca had a good tournament and looked like it would be going through before Colorado Rapids teenager Darren Yapi ended their dreams with a 96th-minute goal in the Round of 16.
At times, Liga MX teams ended up taking each other out, with Mazatlán eliminating Cruz Azul with a shootout victory keyed by its second-choice goalkeeper and Pumas dumping Monterrey out at the group stage as Mexico No. 1 Julio Gonzalez got through a shootout unblemished.
But the idea that this was going to be a revenge moment, a tournament in which Liga MX clubs would flex their muscles and show their dominance in North America didn’t come to fruition.
Instead, it was again a trio of MLS teams able to secure the prize of winning CCC slots, with Columbus and LAFC utilizing their familiar styles of play to reach the final and the Colorado Rapids riding goalkeeper Zack Steffen behind a new-look attack to also get into the continental championship.
While the CCC slots again all went to teams from MLS, this year’s Leagues Cup was different from last year’s. Next year’s tournament will have a different flavor than this one. That’s to be expected as the tournament’s history is written. This is a young competition, now with two years of history and anecdotes to draw on. How teams and supporters experience it will evolve and grow as more and more editions take place.
What won’t change year to year is the culture born from the very nature of the competition. Pitting MLS teams against Liga MX squads creates moments where sometimes neighbor is cheering against neighbor. At times, daughter is cheering against mother or cousin against cousin. At the end, the spirit of the rivalry grows, and the best team moves on.
That connection with clubs, whether a team down the street or two countries south, is what always will keep fans coming back. They turned up for the tournament this year, with more than 1.31 million combined attending games over the course of the frenetic month of soccer. That’s an average of 17,131, the best in the tournament’s young history.
Those links, with the club, with fellow fans, with our family, is what keeps us coming back to the stadium or makes us schedule our lives around watching the games on TV.
What was Leagues Cup? It was the tournament that saw Cucho ball out, Olivier Giroud debut (and score) for his new MLS club. It was a competition that saw the Rapids break out, Mazatlán overachieve, and plenty of clubs fall short. But more than anything, Leagues Cup was the tournament that brought us together.
