Friday, January 19, 2007

Primed Chimping News

USA U20 v Guatemala today at 5:30pm central time in World Youth Championship qualifying from Panama. The third and final match v Panama will be on Sunday at 5pm central. See em both live on GolTV.
-US Soccer has podcasts of a scouting report on Guatemala - and - an interview with USA forward Andre Akpan who bagged a brace v Haiti the other night in the 4-1 win.
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Don't forget that the USA senior side have their 07 debut this weekend too. 4pm central time tomorrow (Saturday) v Denmark from the Home Depot Center in LA. See it live on ESPN2. Join me at the Sweetwater in St Paul for viewing (see details on the Sweetwater from a day or two ago).
-Rob Stone, Eric Wynalda, Bruce Arena and Allen Hopkins will call the game (and the Mexico match on Feb 7).
-Ives Galarcep - and - Andrea Canales - and - Jeff Carlisle at Soccernet with previews.
-US Soccer has a podcast of an interview with Jonathan Bornstein.
-US Soccer also has a special video presentation from the magnificent Jimmy Conrad.
-Grahame Jones of the LA Times with a look at the team heading into Saturdays first game.
-Keep reading the US Soccer weblog for the Team USA January training camp.
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Preki has been given the reigns at Chivas USA. What the hell took them so long? I would have handed over the coaches jacket to him ten minutes after Bob Bradley left. Great move.
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According to the great blog MLS Underground, the MLS All Star game opponent next summer will be Celtic. The game will be played in Denver at the Rapids new home stadium, The Big Dick.
-MLSU also had a note early this week that Colorado is chasing American striker Conor Casey who is set to leave Mainz in Germany and just turned down an offer from RJK in Holland.
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Even Conan O'Brien has jumped on the Beckham band wagon with a satirical view of the deal! Excellent! Check it out on You Tube. (Thanks Joey.)
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UEFA.com calls the Beckham deal "one of the most extraordinary transfers ever."
-On another Beckham note, I really think the reason Real Madrid management and coaches have been ripping the player so hard is that they are embarrassed that he dared leave their team for such an unknown and backwater team as the LA Galaxy. Think about it. Why else would they act so harshly. It's not that they really wanted to keep him on their team, but they have massive ego's and never expected he would have the guts to walk away from them.
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DC United has signed Brazilian forward Luciano Emilio from Honduras club Olimpia. He was their top scorer the past couple of seasons. And it just so happens that DCU plays Olimpia in the CONCACAF Champions Cup in a few weeks.
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On the MLS Designated Player Rumor Mill:
-Edgar Davids to FC Dallas - Dallas coach Steve Morrow has been quoted a couple times now saying he wants Davids and that the two parties have talked.
-Dwight Yorke to Toronto - He is old and not what he was even 5 years ago, but this would be a good move.
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Is there some new news streaming out of San Jose? Seems that Lew Wolff who is trying to bring the Earthquakes back to life has talked to San Jose State University about building a new stadium on campus to replace the E-quakes old home, Spartan Stadium. What a wild turn of events that would be, seeing as the inadequate facility is what drove the team to move to Houston last year. Hopefully we will get more on this soon.
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Celtic has supposedly made a second offer to New England for midfielder Shalrie Joseph but were turned down again. Celtic needs to drop the chump change and make a real offer.
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A couple of MLS players have changed teams in the past week:
-I think I reported last week, but Greg Vanney was sent from Dallas to Colorado. (Or maybe I meant to write that last week and a little illness got in the way.)
-Young David Arvizu finally got his wish to return to his home in Southern California as New York shipped him to Chivas USA. Why the hell didn't this happen last year at this time?
-And I was very surprised to hear Chicago sent Costa Rican striker Andy Herron to Columbus. Good for Sigi Schmid's Crew.
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MLS teams have added further fodder to their preseason rosters in the "supplemental draft" of college players who were not picked last week in the Superdraft. Here is that list.
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Brian McBride will NOT be heading back to MLS anytime soon, seeing as he has signed a 1 year extension to his deal at Fulham in England. Both Columbus and Chicago wanted to bring him home, but I think he has made a great choice to stay at the club where he has had his greatest success as a pro, over the last 3 years. Too bad he didn't get a shot at England 10 years ago, and been a seriously experienced striker in this prime 5 or 6 years back. Oh well. Great for him, and probably for his pocketbook too.
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Fulham coach Chris Coleman makes more comments on new signing Clint Dempsey (from the Fulham home page): Clint Dempsey has to go back to America to sign a few more documents which will take a few days. He hasn’t played for over a month so when he gets back we need to get him match fit as quickly as possible.
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The latest Oguchi Onyewu news: The move to Fulham is dead at this point. He is still talking to two clubs in Italy - Milan & Lazio. And Lyon appears to have joined the chase. Another wild rumor floating around is that Chelsea were interested in Gooch, but the money was not given to coach Jose Mourinho to make the deal, and that is one of the reasons he is so upset with management and ownership right now.
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I got a sad note from "Our Donovan" yesterday saying that former USA goalkeeper David Vanole has died unexpectedly at age 43. He helped the USA qualify for the 1990 World Cup, but was beat out by Tony Meola for the starting job at the WC in Italy. Donovan sent this note along: The qualification of the USA for the 1990 World Cup was the start of a lot of good things that have continued for the USMNT on through to today. I was in St. Louis in October, 1989, watching the USA play Costa Rica in a WCQ where we barley salvaged a tie (1-1). At the very end of the match Costa Rica was given a penalty kick. Vanole saved it, one of those great moments! The next match was in T&T and we won 1-0 on an odd goal that we have all seen many, many times. But, I believe, the save by Vanole was just as significant to our qualifing for WC '90.
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Gabriel Ferrari an 18 year old from the New York Red Bulls youth system has signed a deal with Sampdoria in Italy's Serie A. He is just waiting for the paper work from US Soccer to clear. Unlike another American, who shall remain nameless, who vowed he wants to play for Italy, not the USA, the famously named Ferrari has told Yanks Abroad that he emphatically wants to wear the USA red, white and blue: "I'm born American, grew up in the US and that is the country I would like to play for if I get the chance." And as reader Luke put it in an email to me: "Guiseppe Rossi can kiss my ass." Indeed!
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You know, as much as the Seattle Sounders players are total mooks and I as a Minnesota Thunder fan love to hammer them verbally every chance I get, I must admit that this scheme they have of wearing the worst sweaters they can find when they hit the town is pretty brilliant and shows a level of intelligence and humor I never dreamt was possible from them. So a reluctantly say "hats off to ya boys". Thanks to Elko for dropping his jewel in my lap.
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Milan have signed up long-haired wild-man goal keeper Marco Storari from Messina. He was the only good thing about Messina and I was hoping he might get a shot with a bigger team. Now we shall see if he is for real. Great for him. Will he still wear the pink shirts at Milan?
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This article says doctors in Italy are usual calcio/football to help patients with depression and other more serious mental illness. And all this time I figured that calcio was the main cause of any mental illness in Italy. Who knows, maybe it goes both ways. Thanks to JdB for sending us this.
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Anderlecht midfielder Mbark Boussoufa was named Belgium's Player Of The Year for 06.
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Big Euro matches this weekend:
Saturday-
Liverpeople v Chelsea
PSV v Heerenveen
Sunday-
Inter v Fiorentina
Arsenal v Manchester United
Lazio v Milan
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Mexican teams Necaxa & America were the InterLiga winners and will advance to the Copa Libertadores which starts next week. Necaxa goes directly into group play, while America must play off against a side from Peru to get into the groups.
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Readers of UEFA.com has voted for their Team Of The Year for 2006.
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Feyenoord of Holland have been kicked out of the UEFA Cup due to their racist and rowdy crowds. I like this move. Boo Feyenoord.
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My local club the Minnesota Thunder are sponsoring the screenings of the Zidane movie coming up in early February here at the Walker Art Center. Be there.
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Lastly, I wanna say thanks to BQ for helping with several items in this update. And to all of the rest of you who keep sending nice emails wishing me good health. Thank you very much.

1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

A full report only a week after appendix surgery. Awesome!

10:49 PM  

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