A new ranking system has been announced ahead of the 2024 Concacaf Champions League in order to help determine seedings for the competition.
Despite LAFC's dominant run over the past two seasons in MLS, the Western Conference team are ranked as third-best in the region by the new metric. This may come as a surprise to some as LAFC have booked their ticket to this year's CCL final and have looked comfortable in most of their games this season.
Liga MX sides CF Monterrey and Club America are the top of the list. Leon, who are also in the CCL final against LAFC, are in seventh place. The top 10 list is largely dominated by Liga MX clubs with seven, leaving the remaining three being MLS clubs.
The rankings are based upon club form in domestic league and cup games as well as international club tournaments. Concacaf began tracking the form of clubs in 2017 to guide their club ranking.
Official competitions that Concacaf uses to determine rankings are: Concacaf Champions League, FIFA Club World Cup, domestic first division professional league, Concacaf regional cups and member association cups.
The listed competitions are weighted in the sense that international games award more ranking points than domestic and cup games. Additionally, clubs have the opportunity to gain ranking points by defeating higher ranked opponents but can lose points if they lose to a club that is ranked lower than them with home-field advantage being factored in.
Concacaf has also launched a league ranking system which is different to the club ranking to determine how strong the respective leagues are based on their respective clubs' performances in international competitions.
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This article was originally published on 90min as Concacaf launches new ranking system ahead of expanded 2024 CCL.
