Overview:
Board of Governors met in New York on Wednesday and approved initiatives to speed up play.
Major League Soccer’s Board of Governors met in New York on Wednesday and approved initiatives to speed up play.
Off-field treatment. The rule is intended to cut down on time wasted needlessly when players go down.
If a player remains on the ground for more than 15 seconds, play will stop and the player will be evaluated and then removed from the field, where he will wait for a minimum of two minutes for further assessment and treatment.
Exceptions: potential head injury, goalkeeper injuries, serious medical events, and fouls resulting in yellow or red cards.
The rule change was trialed in MLS Next Pro for the second half of the 2022 season and all of the 2023 season,
Timed substitutions. A substituted player must exit the field within 10 seconds or the incoming player will have to wait for a 60-second holding period before entering the game at the next stoppage.
Exceptions: injury and goalkeeper substitutions.
It’s another MLS Next Pro experiment. In 2023, 99.7% of the more than 3,200 substitutions were completed in 10 seconds or less.
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Observers were closely following MLS for any changes in spending above the increases in the CBA modified in 2021 in the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic that impacted the 2020 season.
There will be no additional Designated Players (maximum 3 per team) or players signed under the U22 Imitative (up to 3 players, depending on the number and type of DPs).
Spending will go up $625,000 to $10,455,000 per team in 2024 (see below).
That amount includes compensation and acquisition costs (transfer fees and agent fees) but doesn’t include costs for Designated Players above the maximum salary budget charge ($683,750 in 2024) and U22 Initiative signings above the maximum salary budget charge ($150,000 to $200,000, depending on age). It also doesn’t include spending on players not on the senior roster (those on slots 21-30).
Year Salary Budget + GAM + Discretionary TAM = Total
2021 $4,900,000 + $1,525,000 + $2,800,000 = $9,225,000
2022 $4,900,000 + $1,625,000 + $2,800,000 = $9,325,000
2023 $5,210,000 + $1,900,000 + $2,720,000 = $9,830,000
2024 $5,470,000 + $2,585,000 + $2,400,000 = $10,455,000
2025 $5,950,000 + $2,930,000 + $2,225,000 = $11,105,000
2026 $6,425,000 + $3,280,000 + $2,125,000 = $11,830,000
2027 $7,068,000 + $3,921,000 + $2,025,000 = $13,013,000
Players, coaches and management at teams like LAFC and the Philadelphia that had long runs in multiple competitions complained about the taxing seasons.
For now, teams will have get no additional competition for their participation in the Concacaf Champions Cup than the unidentified amount of additional GAM already bargained for.