Your Saturday Kickoff: How will the Leagues Cup quarterfinals play out?

What you need to know

Leagues Cup quarterfinals tonight

We got you a gift: All four quarterfinals in one night. Check out the full schedule here.

Real Salt Lake transfer Gómez to Stade Rennais

Real Salt Lake have transferred winger Andrés Gómez to French Ligue 1 side Stade Rennais. The 21-year-old Colombian international exits for a reported $11 million fee that could reach $13 million with add-ons. In all, Gómez departs RSL with 14g/15a spanning 53 league matches. He’s also scored once in two appearances for Colombia.

Charlotte FC transfer Dejaegere to Belgian club

Charlotte FC have transferred midfielder Brecht Dejaegere to Belgian top-flight side KV Kortrijk. The move comes 13 months after Dejaegere joined Charlotte from Ligue 1 side Toulouse FC. He departs after playing in 29 matches. Dejaegere, 33, held a Designated Player roster spot.

The Preview

Leagues Cup is set to give you all four quarterfinal games tonight. Let’s talk it out.

Columbus Crew vs. New York City FC
Watch: Apple TV - MLS Season Pass | Saturday, 6:00 pm ET
Watchability Score: 42/50

The Crew are definitely favorites here. In fact, I’ll go ahead and call them the most likely team to win this whole thing. Thanks to a few upsets, they’ve been gifted a path to the final where they avoid the best that both MLS and LIGA MX have to offer.

However, New York City FC were underdogs against Tigres too. We saw how that turned out. They’re a young and dynamic attacking side that, at times, has received a needed veteran boost from Maxi Moralez in central areas. He provided a goal and an assist in the 2-1 win over Tigres earlier this week and will need to be at his best again to break down the Crew.

That is a possibility though. Columbus will always have their shortcomings defensively simply because of the numbers they commit forward. There will be opportunities for Moralez, Julián Fernández and Hannes Wolf to make things happen on the break. It just takes a couple of moments to put Columbus under genuine pressure… and then a bunch of moments of withstanding attacks from the most explosive team in the league. But still, weird things happen in this sport.

Philadelphia Union vs. Mazatlán
Watch: Apple TV - MLS Season Pass | Saturday, 7:30 pm ET
Watchability Score: 34/50

I don’t have the actual numbers, but I’m guessing like five people in the world had this matchup in their Leagues Cup bracket challenge entry. And those five people probably did it by accident and didn’t realize it until later.

The Union entered this competition on a two-game winning streak, but were still sitting 10th in the Eastern Conference. It would have been fair to dismiss them. It’s been a nightmare of a season and they’re undergoing some renovations at the top of their roster. The whole thing has been a total bummer for one of the league’s most consistently overachieving clubs. But Tai Baribo has burst onto the stage with what feels like 30 goals in the last five games and, suddenly, the Union are favored to make the Leagues Cup semifinals.

To get there, they’ll have to overcome the other biggest surprise of the tournament: Mazatlán, a perennial bottom-half-of-the-table side in LIGA MX. They had no wins in four LIGA MX games coming into this. They were 14th among 18 teams in last year’s Apertura. Yet, here they are after beating D.C. United in the Round of 32 and then taking down a Cruz Azul side that may or may not be aware they were ever actually playing in a tournament. They may still have a little more magic in them.

Seattle Sounders vs. LAFC
Watch: Apple TV - MLS Season Pass | Saturday, 8:00 pm ET
Watchability Score: 46/50

The marquee event of the night features a Western Conference team trying to prove they’ve got their life together and a fellow Western Conference team that beat them 3-0 a few weeks ago and added the most productive striker in the French men’s national team’s history in the meantime.

Seattle have come a long way since then. Or at least it feels like it. All it’s taken to reinspire confidence in this team is big wins over the Galaxy and Pumas in two knockout games. This game has a different edge to it though. Mainly because LAFC have had Seattle's number for years now. The Sounders haven’t beaten LAFC since May of 2021. Six of the last eight meetings have gone to LAFC. If Seattle are truly going to use this tournament as a springboard to something bigger this season, they’re going to have to off the boogeyman.

The problem is the boogeyman keeps getting bigger and scarier. Olivier Giroud could be prepared to make his first start for LAFC tonight. He should at least get significant minutes. Seattle have been strong defensively over the last two games, but dealing with Denis Bouanga, Mateusz Bogusz and Giroud is as tough as it gets… at least until the next round.

Club América vs. Colorado Rapids
Watch: Apple TV - MLS Season Pass, Univision, TUDN | Saturday, 10:00 pm ET
Watchability Score: 39/50

The Rapids have put together an impressive showing after a rough start. They got blasted in the group stage by Portland, but bounced back to make it past Juárez, Club León and Toluca. Now, after making it through the increasingly frightening henchman, they’ve reached the final boss of LIGA MX teams. It will take a special performance to get past América. They have the quality to pull it off on their best day. Like, their best day.

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