2008 A-League Pre-Season Challenge Cup

The 2008 A-League Pre-Season Challenge Cup competition was held in July and August 2008, in the lead up to the start of the Australian A-League football 2008-09 season.

All eight A-League clubs competed and were drawn into two groups of four teams. The format of the cup was modified from previous editions, reducing the number of matches. A group stage with three regular rounds saw team play each other in their group once, with the winner of each group advancing to the final. The final was played on 6 August, the first mid-week final in the competition history. The shortened format allowed clubs to schedule other matches in the lead up to the start of the A-League, and was completed before the 2008 Summer Olympics in which Australia competed.

Continuing from previous years, most Pre-Season Cup matches were played at venues in regional centres to expand the profile of the clubs and the league. Bunbury, Caloundra, Cessnock, Mandurah and Mount Gambier all hosted matches for the first time, while Launceston, Campbelltown, Port Macquarie and Wollongong hosted matches again.

Read more about 2008 A-League Pre-Season Challenge Cup:  Top Goalscorers

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