Crossfit Games force Sounders-Galaxy Open Cup quarterfinal onto track & field stadium

The U.S. Open Cup has often been viewed as a bit of a second-rate tournament. Games are often hosted by teams not using their primary stadiums and made up of players who don’t normally start in regular season matches.

Even the Seattle Sounders — a team with four U.S. Open Cup titles and five finals appearances — have been guilty of contributing to this perception.

Although the LA Galaxy have often been accused of not taking this tournament as seriously as they should, they have at least hosted their games at StubHub Center in recent years (when they’ve managed to host, anyway).

That won’t be the case when they host the Sounders in the Open Cup quarterfinals on July 20. With the Galaxy winning the coin toss for the right to host and StubHub Center being used by the Crossfit Games, that means the game will be played at the nearby Track & Field Stadium. The location has not been formally announced, but Emerald City Supporters have confirmed it after receiving their ticket allocation. The game will kick off at 7:30 p.m. and be streamed on YouTube.

While the Galaxy have never previously hosted an Open Cup game at the 2,000-seat stadium, it is where LA Galaxy II play their home games. LAGII also hosted an Open Cup game there in 2015. A search of Google Images suggests the quality of the grass also appears to be much better than in the attached photo above.

The last time the Sounders played an Open Cup away game at a non-primary stadium was in 2012 when they played the San Jose Earthquakes at Kezar Stadium. The Sounders won that game 1-0, a match that gave us several popular memes.