Leagues Cup 2025

The Sounders are a team with a storied history and respect for tradition. When one talks about the history of soccer in this country, they could not do it justice without the Sounders having more than one significant story arc. Even limited to just our time in MLS, it’s a story with the team from Seattle as the protagonist. It is with this in mind that we look to the coming weeks.

The Lamar Hunt US Open Cup is the longest-lived soccer tournament in the country; it has both history and tradition that places its story central to that of soccer in America. The Sounders, for our contribution to its history, have lifted that cup four times, and, as we reminded the league in 2014, we’re still hungry for more. While we are incredibly proud of the impressive run made by Tacoma Defiance in this year’s competition, we are disappointed that MLS did not allow our first team the opportunity to play in this tournament that’s such an important part of our team legacy and the heritage of American soccer.

The Sounders are the only MLS team to have won the CONCACAF Champions League/Cup, and the only MLS team to have earned its spot in the Club World Cup by being the continental champion. Through twice competing with clubs at the top of world soccer, we understand better than most what it means to go toe to toe against the best clubs in the world, and we know our boys are more motivated than ever to earn their way back to that global stage.

Now, we bring our story to the Leagues Cup. Since its inception in 2019, it’s pretty clearly been a cash grab meant to capitalize on the myriad LigaMX fans residing in the US; this tournament respects neither the story nor tradition of American soccer. If that wasn’t bad enough, MLS has used it as an excuse to reduce teams’ participation in the US Open Cup (a tournament that the league seems not to like because they don’t make money on it). Because of this ECS does not support the Leagues Cup as a tournament. 

We are proud of our boys for earning a place in this year’s Leagues Cup through their strong finish in last season’s standings. Our support is fully with them as they compete for another CCC berth. As a volunteer run group, everything we do depends on the willingness of individual supporters to come out and spend their matchday making it happen. As with the past few years, the overwhelming majority of ECS volunteers are opting out of Leagues Cup, with many sharing their concerns about the competition. This means things will look a little different for the Leagues Cup matches. We will scale the size of the section based on volunteers, which means fewer capos, fewer flags, a smaller ECS section – with the potential for no section if we don’t have enough hands. We know this will be disappointing to some folks. If that’s you: get involved! If you want to make a difference for this year’s tournament, speak up! We need volunteers year-round. Start now, and by the time next year’s League’s Cup starts, you’ll be one of the key volunteers to make things different.