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LAFC faces eight-time Liga MX champions Tigres UANL Tuesday night in both clubs’ third, final, and decisive match in Phase One of Leagues Cup 2025.
The winner will strengthen its chances of advancing to the Knockout Rounds of the 36-team tournament, which features all 18 clubs from Liga MX and 18 select teams from MLS, all battling to determine the single champion of North America’s two top leagues.
A victory for either team won’t guarantee advancement to the Knockout Stage. Only four of 18 teams from each league will move on, so every point earned (and dropped) and every scoring chance finished (and missed) will play a role in the Phase One standings, which won’t be complete until the final five matches on Thursday Aug. 7.
SCHEDULE: Leagues Cup 2025
BLACK & GOLD IN BRIEF
Thus far in Phase One, LAFC has earned three points from two games, most recently its two-point outing against Pachuca on Friday night, when the Black & Gold played the club currently in first place in the Liga MX standings to a 1-1 draw, followed by a 4-2 win in the penalty shootout. LAFC went down a man 30 minutes into the match due to a red card shown to forward Nathan Ordaz, then controlled the match for the next hour and nearly found a late match-winner after Pachuca’s Jhonder Cadiz received a red card in the 83rd minute.
“I really liked the way the team approached the game, started the game up until the red card, very dominant, dangerous, and no threats in the other direction,” manager Steve Cherundolo said. Other than the ten minutes that followed Ordaz’s send-off, during which Pachuca scoring the tying goal, “I thought we were the better team,” Cherundolo added, “even though we had 10 men. I was very pleased with the mentality and the ideas the group had, and the mentality of still trying to win the game even though you have 10 men. Because we believed we could.”
TIGRES UPDATE
As the LAFC-Pachuca thriller was playing out in Los Angeles, Tigres was raising its point total to six by earning its second win in Leagues Cup 2025, a hard-won 2-1 result against Western Conference leaders San Diego FC.
A win at BMO Stadium on Tuesday night would give Los Tigres nine points – the highest possible three-game point total. But their advancement could still come down to tiebreakers such as (in order) goal differential, most goals scored, and fewest goals conceded.
The same tiebreaker system could come into play for LAFC should it take all three points from Tigres. A draw would likely spell the end of the Black & Gold’s Leagues Cup 2025 journey. Nothing is certain in this competition, however. Leagues Cup’s new format has elevated it into a thrilling, country-vs.-country clash of wills and football cultures where unexpected performances and results have become the nightly norm.
STANDINGS: Leagues Cup 2025
“It will be tough to get qualified [for the knockouts],” said Denis Bouanga, who scored LAFC’s lone goal against Pachuca and remains Leagues Cup’s all-time leading scorer, “but we got points today, so we'll see in the game against Tigres what happens.”
LAFC started a very familiar eleven against Pachuca other than center back Nkosi Tafari (making his fifth straight start after the season-ending injury to Aaron Long) and goalkeeper Thomas Hasal (filling in for the legendary Hugo Lloris, who is in Europe updating his U.S. residency status). Tafari and Hasal played pivotal roles in achieving the draw against the high-powered Tuzos attack, and Hasal saved two of the four penalties he faced in the shootout to secure the extra point.
“One of the big reasons I came here was because Hugo was here,” Hasal, 26, said after the game. “I want to play, I want to keep playing as much as I can, but at the end of the day it's also a good opportunity to learn from one of the greats of goalkeeping from the last few decades … and when you get the chance to play you try and enjoy it as much as you can.”
TWO FOR TIGRES
Newly acquired forward Ángel Correa, who joined Tigres from Atletico Madrid last month, scored both goals in Los Tigres’ 2-1 victory over San Diego FC.
“I'm happy with Ángel (Correa), who's adapting very nicely,” Tigres manager Guido Pizarro said after the game. “Credit to his teammates who have treated him very well from day one." Correa also recorded a brace in Tigres’ Leagues Cup opener last week, a 4-1 win over Houston Dynamo FC.
WE HAVE A HISTORY
These two clubs have met before in high-stakes matches.
In the 2020 Concacaf Champions League Final, LAFC took a 1-0 lead over Tigres in the 61st minute through a goal from Diego Rossi (currently with Columbus Crew) before two late goals from Tigres gave the Mexican side a 2-1 win and ended the Black & Gold’s hopes of lifting a trophy in its first ever international competition.
By the time the 2023 Campeones Cup rolled around, LAFC was three years older and had an MLS Cup title under its belt. The one-game trophy match in Sept. 2023 pitted the reigning champs of MLS (LAFC) against the Liga MX champs (Tigres) at BMO Stadium. LAFC was playing a man down when it appeared to take a 1-0 lead through Bouanga in the 78th minute. But the French forward’s goal was negated by a controversial referee decision, as defender Giorgio Chiellini was judged to have touched the ball twice on the free kick that started the build-up.
A scoreless draw at full-time was decided by a penalty shootout that ended with the visitors winning, 4-2.
Bouanga was not with LAFC for the club’s first meeting with Tigres in 2020, but his friend and fellow Frenchman, Gignac, featured in both Tigres wins. “Yes, I often talk to Gignac,” Bouanga said Friday night. “He's happy to come here and we'll be happy to play again. He won one time here, now it's our revenge.”
TIGRES CAN WIN IF
Nahuel Guzman stands tall. The 39-year-old Argentine continues to be one of the most dominant goalkeepers in Liga MX, and his presence in goal against LAFC in their 2020 and 2023 meetings played a big factor in those two results. (So did the presence of current head coach Pizarro, who played all 180 minutes for Tigres in those matches.)
Neither LAFC nor Tigres has trailed in this tournament, through four combined games. Houston scored its lone goal against Guzman following a rare defensive giveaway, while San Diego got on the board through a deflected attempt that floated over Guzman’s 6-foot-3 frame. The lesson: when LAFC’s chances arrive, they must be finished.
LAFC CAN WIN IF
It is ruthless in Tigres’ box. LAFC has played two games in Leagues Cup 2025 that it should have won according to both the eye test and the data. The missing piece has been its finishing. LAFC must locate that piece if it hopes to move on to the knockouts.
If the Black & Gold can find spaces around Tigres defenders Jesús Garza, Juanjo Purata, and Rômulo, and can put one or two past Guzman, the home crowd at BMO Stadium – whose form is never in doubt – can provide the extra push required to seal the three points.
