MLS Announces 2005 Schedule

While European clubs are facing the run-in to the end of the 2004-05 campaign, the USA’s Major League Soccer announced the schedule for its 10th season earlier this week.While European clubs are facing the run-in to the end of the 2004-05 campaign, the USA’s Major League Soccer announced the schedule for its 10th season earlier this week.

192 MLS games which will be played between Saturday 2 April and Sunday 16 October. The 2005 All-Star break will take place on the weekend of July 30 with the MLS Cup champion being crowned on 13 November.

The League has been expanded to twelve teams with the addition of Real Salt Lake and Los Angeles-based Club Deportivo Chivas USA. Each MLS team will play a 32-game programme, an increase of two from 2004. All clubs will play each of their conference opponents four times and each of the six teams in the opposite conference twice.

The first of four games between Chivas USA and the Los Angeles Galaxy on 23 April with break new ground as it will be the first-ever local derby in MLS history.

The new FC Dallas soccer stadium at the Frisco Soccer & Entertainment Center in Frisco, Texas is due to host the MLS Cup on 13 November. DC United won its fourth MLS championship when they defeated Kansas City Wizards in last season’s final played at the Home Depot Center in Carson, California before a crowd of 25,797.

The complete 2005 season schedule can be found at the MLS’ official web site.