tomorrow kicks off the ninth Carolina Challenge Cup and the weather looks like it is going to be awesome for opening day.

ticket sales are brisk (over 4000 sold for Saturdays match as of Thursday) and we are all set for tailgating. Please join us around 3pm near the east stand entrance. Bring some beer to share. You are welcome to bring some chili or a side as well.

great preview last night at the meet and greet up at the 3Lions. the new jerseys look great, the players are excited and the pitch looks great!

according to the Battery twitter account, all the matches are slated to be streamed. i imagine there will be a link on the battery home page close to game time.

Sounds like a great event. You are lucky to have it in your backyard. Have fun Mikey.

thanks its always a good tourney and look forward to it each year. this year they have expanded it to include the six USSF Developmental academies. Chicago fire, Indiana Fire Columbus Crew, DC United NY Red Bulls and SC Battery u16 and u18 teams. they will be playing Friday, Sunday and Monday Looking forward to seeing some of the youngsters play as well.

Today's coverage in the local Post and Courier of the Carolina Challenge Cup is an absolute disgrace. Andrew Miller should be ashamed of how he covered the biggest pre-season soccer tournament in South Carolina.

It was a tiny little story on page 3. Pathetic!!! No photos either. We're talking Major League Soccer here! Miller is part of the problem why soccer continues to struggle to gain popularity here in the United States.

I think Miller's priority seems to be on too much hockey. If you see him at the games tonight or better yet- send him an email via the P&C website and tell him what you think!

An absolute disgrace!

here is the article

http://www.postandcourier.com/news/2012/feb/25/familiar-foes-as-battery-crew-clash-tonight/

I wish they had more indepth coverage as well but they usually do a good post match write up and have never really focused on the feature articles.

Miller is a bit hockey fan and was excited when he announced his blog, but it was too infrequent for me.

Tonight is the STingrays, pink in the rink night so I would bet money on which on he will be at.

just came from downtown, Saw some DC guys near the Mills House, where they are staying and saw some Fire fans walking down Meeting street.

DC United 1-0 over the Fire

DP Hamid Salihi's goal




DC is streaming the games on their team's web page
I'd bet the other MLS teams are also.

http://www.dcunited.com/news/2012/02/preseason-match-5-united-vs-chicago-fire

2-2 for Charleston v Crew

1-0 to DC over Chicago.

Great night to be back at the 'buad, even though it down in the 30s for the match and the wind was pretty steady making feel even colder.

Attendance was announced at 5700+ our largest attendance for the CCC to date IIRC. kudos to the front office staff for their hard work and going up against a couple big festivals and the local hockey teams annual "pink in the rink" night.

here are a couple articles


Local TV highlights (takes a while for the viewer to load up)
http://www.live5news.com/story/17019237/battery-rallies-twice-to-tie-mlss-crew
they only have the first crew goal.

Post and Courier (charleston paper)
http://www.postandcourier.com/news/2012/feb/26/battery-battles-to-tie/
http://www.postandcourier.com/news/2012/feb/26/26_2minutedrill/

Battery Official report
http://www.charlestonbattery.com/news.asp?y=2012&page=1&id=679

MLS report
http://www.mlssoccer.com/news/article/2012/02/25/late-pk-forces-crew-settle-2-2-draw-against-battery

more on DC/Chicago game.


The Battery is hosting the feed and I think all the MLS teams are link it to their pages. should be available for all the matches.

If anyone has any tix for tomorrow's matches they're not going to use, can you shoot me a PM? Thx

tomorrow the pregame meet up will be at Madra Rua at 2is for the US v. Italy match. If you haven't been watching, MLS is doing a road trip to first kick ( http://www.mlssoccer.com/first-kick/road-trip/2012 and the )east coast team of Nick Firchau (extratime radio host) and Fox Soccer host Temryss Lane will be in town. Rumor is they will be at Madra for the US match

They will also be hitting the matches for the CCC and likely the Three Lion as well.

if you see them say hello!