MLS set to return July 8 with the MLS is Back Tournament to be held at the Disney Wide World of Sports complex in Orlando. Here are some of the details of the tournament:
-Teams can begin arriving in Orlando on June 24 but teams will be allowed to stay in their home markets to train if they prefer but must arrive in Orlando no later than one week before their first scheduled match.
-Eastern Conference will have three groups, one consisting of 6 teams each, two consisting of 4 each with Nashville SC moving to the Eastern Conference for the remainder of the 2020 season. Western Conference will have 3 groups, all with 4 teams each.
-Tournament will consist of a group stage with each team playing 3 matches, followed by a knockout stage. The teams are divided in six groups with the top 2 in each group plus the 4 best 3rd place finishers moving on to the knockout stage.
-As the host club, Orlando City SC will be given the top seed in Group A, and will play in the first match on July 8. The five remaining seeds will be the four semifinalists from the 2019 MLS Cup playoffs (Atlanta United, LAFC, Seattle Sounders FC and Toronto FC) and Real Salt Lake, which had the next-highest points total in the Western Conference from the 2019 season. The draw for the tournament is Thursday at 3:30 p.m. ET.
-There will be three matches held per day at the beginning of the tournament with the start times at 9 a.m., 8 p.m. and 10:30 p.m. ET in order to avoid the midday heat in Florida.
-Once they get to the knockout round, there will be no extra time and they will go directly to penalty kicks.
-The tournament final will be played August 11th.
-All of the group stage matches count in the regular-season standings, with the winner of the tournament earning a spot in the CONCACAF Champions League, regardless of whether it is a U.S. or Canadian club. The winner would replace the berth previously awarded to the MLS regular-season points leader in the conference opposite of the 2020 Supporters' Shield winner.
Once the tournament is over, MLS plans to resume their season with a revised schedule in MLS home markets, followed by the MLS Cup Playoffs and the 25th MLS Cup.