You Have Two Choices: Pick Your Nose, Or Read The News

-The Gold Cup final was way too close yesterday with USA beating Panama on PKs after the match finished 0-0. I must say though, that Panama sure has gotten good. They are no '98 Reggae Boyz (Hooray Beer), but they do have some flair and skill. The biggest thing I noticed about the match was the 2 hour pre-game show that Univision put on. Yes that's right, 2 hours! Take that ESPN. Suck on that Fox Soccer Channel! I know very little Spanish, but the thing was good looking (beyond all the hoochies wearing those skin tight jump suits!). Interviews with Keller, Donovan, Asst Coach Curt Onalfo, & Amada Guevara, all done in Spanish. That's not to mention the live, on the field interviews with Keller and Donovan within moments of the final pk.
Gold Cup All-Tournament Team:
G: Jaime Penedo - Panama
D: Oguchi Onyewu - USA
D: Felipe Baloy - Panama
D: Jorge Samuel Caballeros - Honduras
M: DaMarcus Beasley - USA
M: Landon Donovan - USA
M: Jairo Patino - Colombia
M: Luis Ernest Perez - Mexico
F: Luis Tejada - Panama
F: Tressor Moreno - Colombia
F: Wilmer Velasquez - Honduras
with Honorable Mentions to:
G: Kasey Keller - USA
D: Tyrone Marshall -Jamaica
D: Michael Umana - Costa Rica
M: Philip Eveans - South Africa
M: John O’Brien - USA
F: Jorge Dely Valdes - Panama
F: Jafet Soto - Costa Rica
If you go to the Gold Cup section of the US Soccer website, they have a nice video of the end of the Panama match shot from Bruce Arena's vantage point in the sky box where he watched the match (cuz he was suspended), some on the field antics post game, and of course shirtless men in the locker room post game. Very fun to watch.
-The 3 best teams in MLS all lost this weekend. And they lost to the 3 worst teams in MLS. So what should have been a weekend to widen the gap at the top, turned into a weekend to bring the whole thing closer together into one big glop. Colorado killed Chicago 4-1 with two goals from Alain Nkong and the 10th of the year for Jeff Cunningham (who sure as shit better be on that MLS All-Star team replacing the still injured Eddie Johnson). Interim Coach Robert Warczyka is now 2 wins and 1 draw in his first 3 matches. And Chivas has won 2 of the last 3. Not to mention Salt Lake putting 3 on Dallas in the first 30 minutes! What is going on? Here are those scores:
Chivas 1-0 NE
LA 0-1 DC
Columbus 2-0 KC
Colorado 4-1 Chicago
RSL 3-0 FCD
SJ 2-1 Metro
So now the full table looks like this (* indicates teams who would miss the playoffs if they started today):
36 Chicago
35 New England
34 FC Dallas
34 San Jose
29 DC United
29 Kansas City
28 Los Angeles
25 Metrostars*
21 Columbus*
21 Colorado
16 Real Salt Lake*
12 Chivas USA*
-The USA's only consistently dominating player at the recent U20 World Championship was Benny Feilhaber from UCLA. Over the weekend he signed a deal to play for HSV Hamburg in the Bundesliga. Fantastic for him!
-Now the word is that Guus Hiddink is going to coach both PSV and Australia. If I were PSV I would be pissed off. But maybe this is the only way they could pretend to keep him. They should fire his ass.
-The speech Big Sam gave about my fave Mexican Jared Borgetti to the Bolton faithful:
"We are just waiting for the all clear on the medical. I am glad to say everything else is in place and by the time we get back home everything should be sorted out. The fee has been agreed with his Club and personal terms are all sorted."
-FC Dallas insiders are saying that Eddie Johnson will be out until October. In case you didn't know, he has a stress fracture in his foot (which foot, I don't know).
-14 Second Qualifying Round (first leg) matches in the UEFA Champions League take place this Tues & Wed. Dynamo Kyiv, Liverpool & Celtic all have games. My personal dark horse, Sheriff are in Belgrade to take on Partizan. Here are all the matchups.
-Chelsea beat Milan 1-0 in Boston. Arjen Robben scored the goal. Milan plays Chicago at Soldier Field on Wednesday, and Chelsea play DC United at Fed Ex Field on Thurs. The DC v Chelsea match will be live on ESPN2 at 7pm central. Wednesdays Chicago v Milan match is live on GolTV at 8pm central.
-Manc City are in the process of signing Aston Villa striker Darius Vassell.
-Inter have flown to England to take on Leicester, Norwich, Crystal Palace & Portsmouth in preseason matches. Late last week Inter tried to pull out of these matches due to "security concerns", but were persuaded to go ahead with the matches.
-Balitmore Sun has a feature on Santino Quaranta: Quaranta is making healthy gains