MLS All-Stars to Face Liga MX All-Stars in 2020

As MLS celebrates its 25th season, the MLS All-Stars will face off against Liga MX All-Stars for the first time.

Kelvin Kuo-USA TODAY Sports

MLS’ 25th season will feature a first-time showdown between the best players from CONCACAF’s two highest-profile leagues.

MLS All-Stars will take on their counterparts from Liga MX, Mexico’s top professional league, on July 29, 2020 at Banc of California Stadium in Los Angeles. With MLS celebrating its 25th season, the matchup represents the first All-Star Game where the league’s players will face a team of All-Stars from an outside association.

The 2020 All-Star Game is part of an ongoing effort from MLS and Liga MX to continue building a rivalry between the leagues and their teams. The CONCACAF Champions League, in existence since 1962, was long the only opportunity for clubs from opposite sides of the U.S.-Mexico border to compete, but MLS and Liga MX recently partnered to introduce the Campeones Cup (launched in 2018) and the Leagues Cup (launched in 2019) to increase cross-league competition. 

The U.S., Mexico and Canada will also collaborate to host the 2026 FIFA World Cup in North America.

MLS experimented with a number of All-Star Game formats over the years but lined its All-Stars up against a European club opponent for each of the last 15 exhibitions. In recent years, the MLS representatives dropped four straight-games against teams from the Premiere League, La Liga and Serie A, ahead of a 3-0 defeat at the hands of Atletico Madrid at Soldier Field in Chicago in 2019.

“We are so pleased to bring the 2020 MLS All-Star Game presented by Target to Los Angeles, one of the great soccer markets in North America,” MLS  commissioner Don Garber said in a statement. “As we celebrate our 25th season, we wanted to deliver a unique and unprecedented format for our annual All-Star game. Our first-ever game between the best of MLS and Liga MX’s top players is the perfect way to build on the growing relationship between the two top soccer leagues in the region.”

This will be the first marquee midsummer match held in Los Angeles since 2003, when the MLS All-Stars defeated Mexican side Chivas 3-1.