Most Significant Game in American Club Soccer History

...now that I have your attention.

I've talked about Real Salt Lake's journey through the CONCACAF Champions League a few times.  A small-market team with a comparatively tiny payroll (less than half of David Beckham's salary) has spent the last year shipping themselves all over North America for this very night.  After drawing 2-2 at Monterrey last week, RSL hosts the Mexican powerhouse tonight for a chance at the FIFA Club World Cup at Japan in December.  Expecting over 20,000 in attendance, RSL has single-handedly taken a tournament from Eurosnob obscurity to the point where players, coaches, and fans from all over the league have sent their well wishes to the organization for tonight's match.  After all, Salt Lake is looking to be the first team to ever represent the United States at the Club World Cup.

The event (10 pm EDT, Fox Soccer Channel, CONCACAF TV) has been almost unavoidable.  Even "non-soccer" media has dubbed it as more important than any MLS match in history.  Those closer to the situation have been able to communicate with the common fan and equate it with the obviously larger UEFA Champions League, and therefore boost its local and national relevance.

While I can't sit here and say that a Salt Lake win would forever change the landscape of American soccer as we know it (it would take a US World Cup win to do that so swiftly), the theme of "every little step helps" rings as true as ever.  Regardless of your allegiance, seeing Kyle Beckerman hosting the trophy in street clothes would be one of the most monumental moments in American soccer history.  And many people won't realize that until after it happens (God willing).  But that's okay with me.

World Cup Qualifying


CONCACAF's new qualification format, as mentioned last month, has officially been submitted to FIFA for approval (more than likely a mere formality; it should be approved rather quickly).  The only difference from last month's report is that, like Asia, CONCACAF will be staging the first round of qualification before the official draw in July.  Announced yesterday, the round will begin June 3, with two-legged match-ups seeded according to the March 9 rankings, as opposed to a random draw (which would have happened had this round occurred after the July draw in Brazil).  The return legs will be played June 7.

The match-ups are as follows.
#26 Belize v. #35 Montserrat
#27 Dominican Republic v. # 34 Anguilla
#28 British Virgin Islands v. #33 U.S. Virgin Islands
#29 Saint Lucia v. #32 Aruba
#30 Turks and Caicos Islands v. #31 Bahamas

The winners will advance to the second round, a group stage with teams ranked 7-25.  The US, ranked #1 in CONCACAF, have a bye to the third round.