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!

Game day.

Article from the Post and courier on Tommy Heinemann

http://www.postandcourier.com/news/2012/feb/29/former-battery-star-enjoying-his-return/

post more when I find them

Can watch live via the streams on the teams homepages.

Thanks for the heads up! I'm so freekin' stoked to head down there this coming weekend!!!!

Hey guys, I've been coming to the tournament since all the way back when Wilmington used to play and even saw Freddy Adu's debut...but when I ordered tix this year, they told me I could NOT purchase pub passes.

Really bummed and if anyone can help or put me in touch with the right palms to grease that would be great!

Can't wait for Saturday!

ATL who did you call? I know they pub passes for the weekend are hard to get just due to the volume of people coming. if you can, swing by our tailgate before the match and we'll see if we can scrounge any up for you. Well be set up near the East Stand Entrance ask around for Mikey and hope we can help you out.


not the Result we wanted last night, but I thought the score wasn't indicative of the score line. Some good things I thought were Falvey and Flatley on the middle in the back. I also thought be looked pretty good up top and created some good chances. Jose Cuevas goal was a thing a beauty. and Kelly looks like his game improved in the offseason.

report from the local paper
http://www.postandcourier.com/news/2012/mar/01/wilson-battery-cant-hold-off-dc-united/

MLS Road Trip coverage
http://www.mlssoccer.com/video/2012/03/01/mls-road-trip-sights-sounds-carolina-challenge-cup

Mikey-the ticket office said only season ticket holders could get in this year...I've always been able to just buy them with my tix so who knows (6 yrs in a row) why it's changed. Thanks for the offer-i'll try to drop by the tailgate!

I usually avoid slamming our local media, I feel we typically get more coverage in print and TV than most soccer clubs in the US. But I have to agree about the Battery Blog in the P&C. Nothing since 8/4/2011....c'mon man. We're starting a new season, new players coming in, a few have moved on, MLS teams in town along with some top youth club teams in the US, preseason scrimmages against the local college boys. It's not like there's a shortage of material. I thought the point of a blog was to put out short, frequent updates that don't require a lot of prep time, editing, reviewing, etc. If its too much effort, fine, then take down the link. I'd rather that than to keep checking for an update only to find nothing. They don't use interns/slaves at the newspaper? Hell, get a local high school student and let them do it for free and get some journalism experience.