Jägermeister Cup Round 1 Preview: all you need to know
It’s time for the USL Jägermeister Cup to kick off. It’s guaranteed that there will be a new champion this season as the 2024 winners, Northern Colorado Hailstorm, were booted from League One (due to some financial issues mostly). As previously explained, the format is for a World Cup-style group round followed by a knockout tournament. The 38 teams are split into 6 groups (groups 1 and 2 having an extra team each). Each team will only play 4 group games, so will not face every team in its group. Advancing to the single-elimination rounds will be the 6 group winners plus the 2 next-highest points winners.
The Birmingham Legion is in Group 3 and will play Chattanooga Red Wolves (Sunday, 4:00pm, ESPN+) and Forward Madison at home and FC Tulsa and Indy Eleven away. The team it will not play is One Knoxville SC.
One important fact: there will be no draws in the Cup. If a game is tied at the end of regulation, each team will be awarded a point and will then have a penalty shootout, the winner being awarded an extra point. That’s significant for the Legion this weekend…
The most important part
Between league play and the Open Cup, the Red Wolves have played 8 games to date this year. In those 8 games they have been awarded 5 penalties and conceded 4. The three Open Cup games were all decided by a penalty shootout. None of those shootouts went more than 5 rounds. In the first of those the Red Wolves brought on regular starting goalkeeper Jason Smith as a field player late in extra time and he took the third PK, converting it.
So it’s safe to say that the Red Wolves have had more than their fair share of practice at PKs (they’ve taken 19 and converted 18). Thus it was not surprising that the Three Sparks ended practice yesterday with an extended set of penalties.
The teams Chattanooga beat in the Open Cup were New Jersey Alliance (an amateur team in NISA Nation), Chattanooga FC of MLSNP and the Las Vegas Lights. All three games were away (sort of in the Chattanooga FC game). Conversely, they are not doing so well in League One. Their only win was a 1-0 result at home against Greenville Triumph for a 1-1-3 record. It should also be borne in mind that they beat the Legion 2-1 in a preseason game back in February. They are below the playoff line in League One right now but are not a team to take lightly.
In league play they have exclusively used a 3-4-3 setup, sometimes with a single striker, sometimes with 2. They have only given up 6 goals in League One and three of those were penalties. They are a hard nut to crack and should not be taken lightly.
I spoke with Sam McIllhatton and even as a newcomer to the league he gets it. He said, “We’ve been preparing like any other game. We know they are a division below but I don’t know if there’s that much difference between the divisions.” Quite so. He added, “Obviously they’re going to be out to beat us because we are in a higher division but it’s another game we need. We need to get some rhythm. We need to get off to a good start in this competition as well and try to get our season starting to click.”
I also asked how he is settling in here in the Magic City. He’s finding the people very friendly (of course) but hasn’t had much of a chance to explore yet as he’s still in a hotel 5 minutes from the training facility. He noted that “level is a little bit higher” as compared with the NPL in Australia where he previously played and that “the professionalism is the difference.” As far as last week is concerned his comment was “disappointed.” ‘Nuff said.
On the subject of why he didn’t move up to the A-League (Australia’s top flight, for which he had been tipped as a valid talent) his answer was interesting: “From NPL to A-League is very different. A-League [teams] don’t see NPL players as full-time players – which they’re not – but they overlook sometimes the quality of the NPL.” Huh. Snobbery down under was not on my bingo card.
So he came here and, as it turns out, that was a lot easier than might be expected. His mother is from Maine and so he holds US citizenship1I previously noted that his LinkedIn says this and had assumed it was an error. My bad!. Which also means he does not occupy an international slot on the Legion roster (the standard allocation is 7).
Eric Avila was also not happy with last week’s result. “That was a moment that…we kind of self-inflicted on ourselves..We wanted to control but we also didn’t get enough in the final third to finish it off. And when you leave a team that’s obvioulsy looking for their own win and you keep them lingering, something’s gonna happen.”
He noted that the only player truly on the injury list now is AJ Paterson, who probably will remain out until July. As far as Phanuel Kavita is concerned, he said, “He has a potential to start and I think this is a great game to get some minutes in.” This is good news of course but the team has had issues with dynamics with so many guys out of training. On a new cup tournament had noted, “The Open Cup was a bad taste in our mouths. Really bad and you do not want to fall for that again. This is a serious one that we’re trying to go and win.”
On the Red Wolves he added, “They are going to be a well-organized team, but they’re going to be a physical, a strong team…It’s another team that plays with 5 in the back, so that’s something that we have to understand how to break down, especially within a low block, right? Because they have all the numbers back and that’s what we kind of struggled on.”
Prediction: I’m beginning to get nervous about predictions. But I’m still going to make one. The Legion gets back on track and wins this one without going to penalties.
Best of the rest
There are 19 Cup games between tonight and Wednesday in the first round. Since there are 36 teams between the two leagues, you would expect that to mean all teams are playing, but the Colorado Springs Switchbacks and Monterey Bay are not on the schedule. Las Vegas Lights and AV Alta both have two games this round. Go figure. Other than the South Georgia Tormenta v. Greenville Triumph game all League One teams are playing against Championship teams. That means there are 5 all-Championship matchups. Here are the Forge’s picks for viewing (they are all Saturday games):
FC Naples v. Charleston Battery (6:00pm, ESPN+)
The League One rookies are riding high, sitting on top of the standings with an impressive 4-1-2 record. The Battery of course are always a team to watch so this should be a really good test for the Floridians.
Louisville City v. Richmond Kickers (6:30pm, ESPN+)
Richmond are 4th in League One and have been a bit sporadic overall. Then again, Lou City have been slightly less than their normal indomitable selves. This has the potential for an interesting matchup.
Tampa Bay Rowdies v. The™ Miami FC (6:30pm, ESPN+)
An all-Florida contest featuring a team that is struggling and a team that usually struggles but has put up two straight solid wins. Not only that, but the Legion heads to St. Pete next week for a possible head-coachless game.
Sacramento Republic v. AV Alta (9:00pm, CBS Sports Golazo)
AV Alta is the other League One expansion team this season, based in Lancaster, CA (not too far from LA) They aren’t doing as well as Naples but have a couple of good results under their belts. SacRep is finding it rough going so far and are ripe for an upset.
