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As the illustrious Jim Mora once said:
“Playoffs? Don’t talk about - playoffs? You kidding me? Playoffs?”
Well, now we’re in the time to talk about them. Thursday afternoon Major League Soccer officially changed the qualification structure for the 2020 MLS Cup Playoffs. Thursday afternoon the league announced that the 2020 standings would be determined by points per game rather than by points as tradition. This came six days after the Supporters’ Shield was reinstated as being awarded for this season.
The Supporters’ Shield winner, if they are a US based team will be awarded a spot in the 2021 CONCACAF Champions League along with the MLS Is Back Tournament winner and the MLS Cup winner, provided that team is also American. The fourth spot to the CCL is provided to the winner of the US Open Cup which was not played this season, no word has been said of who will get that berth. The 2020 Canadian Championship will determine the Canadian side going to the CCL. That match will be a meeting between Toronto FC of MLS and Hamilton’s Forge FC of the Canadian Premier League.
With this news Minnesota United jumped to fourth in the Western Conference ahead of Los Angeles Football Club, clinching the Loons second playoff spot since moving to Major League Soccer four years ago.
The league also made the announcement that Decision Day on Sunday November 8th will be the final match of the regular season and that a total of six matches will not be rescheduled. Five including Colorado Rapids and Minnesota’s third of four matches with FC Dallas.
The news kept on rolling in yesterday as the club announced Friday morning they made three additional signings. MNUFC acquired the trio of Sam Gleadle, Foster Langsdorf, and Kevin Partida all from Reno 1868 in the USL Championship. Partida has played three seasons for Reno, Gleadle two, and Langsdorf one.
In addition Sam Gleadle will not occupy an International slot for MNUFC as the Englishman does hold a green card. All three will join the club once any mandatory quarantine period has been completed. Look for a more detailed scouting report on the trio from us in the upcoming days.