The Lamar Hunt US Open Cup heats up this week, with mucho matches, including a compelling match between my very own FC Dallas and USL upstarts, Charleston Battery. Not much by way of televised matches, but the Battery offer a one-off PPV webcast for only five bucks. Check it out at charlestonbattery.com
It’s actually a little humiliating for the FC Dallas franchise that a 2nd division team is outdoing them in Cup coverage.
If you’re not hip to the whole Open Cup concept, there’s a good overview at Wikipedia, and a really good thread over at BigSoccer about favorite USOC memories (the original post was written by one of the great men in American Soccer, Peter Wilt).
It bugs me every year that this great old tournament doesn’t get the coverage it deserves. But things are slowly but surely getting better. Fox Soccer Channel has signed on to show the final, and press coverage is growing. My hope is that in my lifetime it will be an important American sporting event on par with the U.S. Open (tennis and golf versions).
Get on board, and bug your local team and your local media outlets to get on board as well.
