Philadelphia Union will find out their opponent for the 2023 Concacaf Champions League season on Monday night, when the confederation hosts the draw for the latest edition of the tournament. The draw will start at 7 pm ET, and will be streamed on YouTube.
The Boys in Blue earned the debut appearance in the tournament after winning the Eastern Conference Supporters' Shield given to the club that earns the most points in MLS regular season play.
Concacaf Director of Competitions Carlos Fernandez will conduct the draw alongside former players from the region.
The official draw will be executed using a double-blind system and four pots. Pots 1 and 2 will contain the spheres with the names of the 16 participating clubs, and Pots A and B will contain the spheres with the bracket positions for the round of 16.
Based on the 2023 SCCL Ranking (more information is available here), clubs will be distributed in Pots 1 and 2 as follows (in alphabetical order per pot):
Pot 1: Vancouver Whitecaps FC, Atlas FC, CF Pachuca, Club Leon, Los Angeles FC, Orlando City SC, Philadelphia Union, 2022 MLS Cup Champions
Pot 2: LD Alajuelense, Alianza FC, Violette AC, CD Olimpia, Motagua FC, RCD España, Tigres UANL, Tauro FC
The round of 16 bracket positions will be divided into Pots A and B as follows:
Pot A: A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, A6, A7, A8
Pot B: B1, B2, B3, B4, B5, B6, B7, B8
The draw will begin by randomly selecting a sphere from Pot 2, followed by a sphere from Pot B to confirm the club’s round of 16 bracket position. The same process will apply for the remaining clubs in Pot 2, always drawing a club, followed by a bracket position from Pot B.
Once the eight clubs in Pot 2 have been assigned to a round of 16 bracket position, the first sphere from Pot 1 will be randomly drawn, followed by a bracket position sphere from Pot A. The same procedure will apply for all Pot 1 spheres.
At the end of the draw, each round of 16 matchup will feature one club from each pot and no more than one club from each country (per competition regulations, clubs from the same country cannot face each other in the round of 16).
