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On Thursday, Canada Soccer unveiled the new format, draw procedure and hosting duties for the 2024 edition of the TELUS Canadian Championship.
The national cup competition, which will feature 14 sides, including all eight Canadian Premier League clubs, is set to kick off on April 23. All eight CPL sides will enter the tournament in the Preliminary Round, which will also include three first-time entrants: League1 Ontario’s Simcoe County Rovers, Ligue1 Québec side CS St-Laurent and the Victoria Highlanders of League1 British Columbia. The competition’s 2023 champions, the Vancouver Whitecaps, as well as finalists CF Montréal were given a bye to the quarterfinals.
After the single-leg preliminary round, both the quarterfinal and semifinals will feature a home-and-away format, culminating in a single-match Final. The draw for the Preliminary round and quarterfinal pathway will be held on Friday. A further draw for the semifinals and final will be held after those two rounds have been completed.
Below are the full details outlining the new format.
Competition Format & Schedule
The 2024 TELUS Canadian Championship will be played across nineteen total matches culminating with the Final in late September. The fourteen participating clubs represent five different leagues: Major League Soccer (MLS), Canadian Premier League (CPL), League1 BC (L1BC), League1 Ontario (L1O), and Ligue1 Québec (L1Q).
The opening stage Preliminary Round will be played in a single-match format with twelve clubs entering into West and East regionalized brackets. The six Preliminary Round matches will be played between April 23 and May 1.
The six winning clubs from the Preliminary Round will advance to the Quarterfinal stage where they will join 2023 champions Vancouver Whitecaps FC and 2023 finalists CF Montréal who receive first-round byes. The Quarterfinal phase will be played in a two-match home and away series format with matches scheduled throughout the month of May.
The four remaining clubs will advance to the Semifinal stage which will also be contested in a two-match home and away format, with the first leg played between July 9-10 and the second leg played on August 27-28.
The 2024 Canadian Championship Final will be played as a single match on September 24 or 25.
