Arctic conditions still threaten Inter Miami’s Champions Cup match at Sporting KC | OneFootball

Concacaf Champions Cup (first round, Match 1 of 2); 8 p.m. EST Wednesday; Children’s Mercy Park, Kansas City, Kan.; FOX Sports 2 (English), TUDN (Spanish); ESPN 106.3 FM (English), Deportes Radio 760 AM (Spanish)

Kansas City is frozen. The area was under a winter storm warning through at least noon Wednesday and a cold weather advisory through at least midnight Thursday, sending a chill through Concacaf and Major League Soccer officials hoping Inter Miami CF and Sporting Kansas City will be able to play the first match of their Champions Cup first-round tie without further interfering with the clubs’ schedules.

The Herons and Sporting were scheduled to play Tuesday at Children’s Mercy Park, but the threat of snow caused organizers to postpone the match a day, to 8 p.m. Wednesday. But the National Weather Service is predicting temperatures well below freezing until at least Saturday; Wednesday’s high is expected to be 9 degrees Fahrenheit, with wind chills as low as -20.

Both teams are scheduled to start their 2025 MLS seasons Saturday; Inter Miami already has had to reschedule its home opener against New York City FC from 2:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. EST to provide a few hours’ more recovery time after the Cup match Wednesday; Sporting will travel to Austin for an 8:30 p.m. date. The Kansas side will visit South Florida for the second leg of their Cup tie on Tuesday, Feb. 25. That match is scheduled at 8:30 p.m. in the warmer confines of Chase Stadium in Fort Lauderdale.

An Inter Miami content creator had reported Sunday that Lionel Messi hoped to skip playing in freezing conditions, but Herons coach Javier Mascherano in a news conference before the match had been postponed said Messi would be “100 percent available.”

But with dangerously cold windchill temperatures — the National Weather Service is advising people to stay indoors if possible and keep any trips outside brief — Concacaf needs to consider any and all alternatives. Temperatures below 5 degrees Fahrenheit can cause frostbite, a likelihood exacerbated as windchill temperatures drop. Several cases of frostbite were reported after a Kansas City Chiefs playoff game against the Miami Dolphins at Arrowhead Stadium in January 2024; the temperature that night (Jan. 13, 2024) dropped to minus 3 with a windchill of minus 25 at halftime. Media reported that at least “some” fans needed amputations because of related tissue damage.

The Concacaf Champions Cup — formerly the Champions League — is the premier competition for clubs in North and Central America and the Caribbean. It is sponsored by Concacaf, the association responsible for organizing international competitions in the region under FIFA’s umbrella. It also is a Holy Grail of sorts for U.S.-based clubs; since the competition began in 1962, Mexican sides have won 39 titles; the United States has three: D.C. United in 1998, the Los Angeles Galaxy in 2000, and the Seattle Sounders in 2022. The tournament’s winner automatically qualifies for the following year’s FIFA Club World’s Cup.

Inter Miami is playing in just its second — but second straight — Cup tournament. The Herons qualified for the 2024 competition by winning the MLS/Liga MX Leagues Cup in 2023 and earned a spot in this year’s bracket by winning the MLS Supporters’ Shield, a trophy presented to the league’s best regular-season team, last year. The Pink & Black edged MLS rival Nashville SC in a home-and-home Cup tie before losing to Mexican side CF Monterrey in the quarterfinals.

Sporting KC is playing in its seventh Champions competition and has reached the finals twice, in 2002 and 2019. The club, which began as the Kansas City Wiz in 1996, is a surprise qualifier in this year’s event. Sporting qualified as runner-up in the 2024 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup (won by Los Angeles FC) but finished 13th — next to last —in the Western Conference and missed the MLS Cup playoffs with just 31 points in the regular season (Inter Miami, the Eastern Conference champion, set a league record for points with 74).