Category F News

Freddy Adu is all but gone. To Portugal. The deal is nearly done and he is already at Benfica, and I would assume he will start training with his new team right away. Benfica finished third in the league last year, but only 3 points away from winners Porto. The club is best known for legendary 60's & 70's striker Eusebio. This is exactly the type of club Freddy needed to go to, not some giant club where he would be lost in the shuffle.

~and~

Can someone explain something to me? How come Houston has almost no Latino players and tons of Latino fans, while Dallas has tons of (great) Latino players and almost no Latino fans?

~and~

It still looks as though that USA v Mexico match in Mexico City on Sept 9 is going to happen. We should be getting an announcement soon.


SuperLiga - MLS v FMF - The action continues to roll strong.
-See all the matches En Vivo on TeleFutura.
You can also see all the matches live online at the website linked above. (thanks to everyone who gave me the heads up on that one)
-Round 1 matches & scores:
FC Dallas 1-1 Chivas Guadalajara - Dal goal by Arturo Alvarez. Guad goal by Antonio Olvera.
Los Angeles Galaxy 2-1 Pachuca - LA goals by Alan Gordon & Landon Donovan. Pach goal by Rafael Marquez.
DC United 1-1 Morelia Monarchas - DC goal by Christian Gomez. Mor goal by Diego Martinez.
Houston 1-0 Club America - Hou goal by Nate Jaqua.
-Round 2 matches:
FC Dallas 1-1 Pachuca - Dal goal by Carlos Ruiz. Pach goal by Christian Gimenez(PK).
Match report by Gabriel Cabarrouy of the Dallas Morning News.
Match report by Tobias Xavier Lopez of the Fort Worth Star Telegram.
Stream Of Consciousness - Match report(?) by DJ Walker at 3rd Degree.
Los Angeles Galaxy 1-2 Chivas Guadalajara - LA goal by Landon Donovan. Guad goals by Francisco Rodriguez & Omar Bravo.
Match report by Luis Bueno of the Press Enterprise.
Match report by Grahame Jones of the LA Times.
Match report by Billy Witz of the Daily Breeze.
DC United 1-0 Club America - Goal by Rod Dyachenko.
Match report by Steven Goff of the Washington Post.
Match report by John Haydon of the Washington Times.
Post-game notes and player ratings by Goff on his Soccer Insider blog.
Houston Dynamo 1-1 Monarcas Morelia - Hou goal by Joseph Ngwenya. Mor goal by Marcio Batista.
Match report by Bernardo Fallas of the Houston Chronicle.
Post-game notes from Fallas on his Soccer y Futbol blog.
-Round 3 matches
Tue Jul 31
FC Dallas v Los Angeles Galaxy - Pizza Hut Park - Frisco TX - 7:00 central
Chivas Guadalajara v Pachuca - Dick's Sporting Goods Park - Commerce City CO - 9:00 central
Wed Aug 1
DC United v Houston Dynamo - Robertson Stadium - Houston TX - 7:00 central
Club America v Monarcas Morelia - Toyota Park - Bridgeview IL - 9:00 central
-Semifinals Tue Aug 14 & Wed Aug 15.
-Final Wed Aug 29.
Standings:
Group A
4-Chivas Guadalajara
3-Los Angeles Galaxy
2-FC Dallas
1-Pachuca
Group B
4-Houston Dynamo
4-DC United
2-Morelia Monarcas
0-Club America
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Club America become the first team eliminated. No team has secured a spot in the Semifinals yet.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Andrea Canales at Soccernet draws some conclusions from the first 2 rounds of SuperLiga matches.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

MLS
Matches & scores this week:
-Thu Jul 26
New York 0-2 Chivas USA - Goals by Ante Razov & Sacha Kljestan.
-Sat Jul 28
Salt Lake 1-2 New England - Goal by Pat Noonan & Jeff Larentowicz. RSL goal by Carey Talley(PK).
Match Report from MLSnet.
Match report by Michael C Lewis of the Salt Lake Tribune.
Match report from the Deseret Morning News.
Post-game notes from the Deseret.
-Sun Jul 29
Toronto 0-3 Chicago - Goals by Ivan Guerrero, Calen Carr & Floyd Franks.
Match report from MLSnet.
Match report by Dean McNulty of the Toronto Sun.
Match report by Morgan Campbell of the Toronto Star.
Match report by Larry Millson of the Toronto Globe & Mail.
Kansas City 3-2 Chivas USA - KC goals by Kerry Zavagnin, Davy Arnaud & Yura Movsisyan. Chiv goals by Jonathan Bornstein & John Cunliffe.
Match report from MLSnet.
Match report by Bob Luder of the KC Star.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

DC United defender Bobby Boswell speaks his mind - in the middle of the night.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The Kansas City Star with a big profile of Wizards striker Eddie Johnson. (story ran before Sunday's game.)
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The KC Star also says that Colorado midfielder Mehdi Ballouchy received a 2 game suspension from the league for the elbow he threw at KC's Sasha Victorine 2 weekend ago. I can find no corroboration of this anywhere else on the internets though.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Luis Arroyave of the Chicago Tribune with an article on the signing of Paulo Wanchope by the Fire.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Chicago has lost defender Jim Curtain for the rest of the season due to an injury of unknown proportion.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Boca Juniors forward Martin Palermo has again expressed interest in playing in MLS.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Looks like Jim Brennan may be the next Toronto FC patient in the medical ward. They think he has a broken rib.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Dean McNulty of the Toronto Star writes about an odd situation for TFC, and how their roster of nation and foreign players is sorted differently from every other MLS team. I knew this would come up at some point this year.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Frank Dell'apa of the Boston Globe with an article on the New England free kicks this season. Warning: Don't get scared when the big picture of Jeff Larentowicz pops up at the top of the article. And ya know what else - I have to admit that Larentowicz is turning into a pretty fine players. I seriously doubted his skills a couple years ago, but Steve Nicol is right about this guy. Good for him.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Tobias Xavier Lopez of the Fort Worth Star Telegram with his thoughts on Beckhamania.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Ivan Orozco of the Daily Breeze with an article on the growing respect Mexican players say they have for MLS and American soccer.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Shawn Mitchell of the Columbus Dispatch with an article on the low low salaries of MLS compared to the big leagues.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Pete Gratoff of the KC Star has the latest news on a new Stadium for the Wizards.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The Business Journal with the first news on MLS in Milwaukee in a good long time. It involves teaming up with the local race track. That location is not bad. Interesting.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

icLiverpool with an article critical of the Home Depot Center, in particular, for renting out their facility to things like the X-Games. Do they know how much money the HDC makes on this stuff. They are trying to run a business at a profit so they can build their teams and league after-all. One good way to do that is my MAKING MONEY. This is how MLS is going to do in 20 years what other leagues took 50-100 years to do. Phil Neville of Everton has a few quotes at the end of the article on the state of the game in America too.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The New Jersey Ironmen of the MISL have contacted Tony Meola about playing for them.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

A small newspaper called the Eastern Arizona Courier has an article on a young man playing for the local Real Salt Lake affiliated youth team. This is what its all about.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Sounds to me like Drew Carey and Michael Davies could be teaming up to get into the soccer business. I like this a lot.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

MLS International Friendly's
Matches& Scores this week:
Sat Jul 28
Columbus 1-3 Aston Villa Colu goal by Jason Garey. AV goals by Ashley Young, Gareth Barry & Luke Moore.
Match report by Shawn Mitchell of the Columbus Dispatch.
Match report from the Aston Villa website.
Post-game comments from Aston Villa manager Martin O'Neill from the team website.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Bob Verdi of the Chicago Tribune says we are target="new" ONCLICK="out=false""Still Waiting For The Soccer Revolution". I hate to break it to old Bob but that happened a long time ago, it just didn't happen the way he expected it too. Subtlety.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

USL First Division
Matches & scores this week:
Thu Jul 26
Minnesota 1-2 California
Portland 0-0 Atlanta
Fri Jul 27
Vancouver 2-2 Seattle
Sat Jul 28
Carolina 1-4 Miami
Rochester 4-2 Minnesota
California 0-1 Puerto Rico
Tue Jul 31
Charleston v Miami
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Unbeknownst to us hardcore Minnesota Thunder fans (and hardcore Red Bull fans as well) the Thunder took NYRB midfielder Sinisa Ubiparipovic to Rochester with them on loan Saturday. He scored our first goal. But our boys went on to lose 4-2. There is no word on whether or not he will continue on loan with the team or it was a one off.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

USL 1D Standings:
37 Portland
32 Seattle
30 Rochester
29 Puerto Rico
28 Vancouver
28 Montreal
27 Miami
26 Atlanta
23 Charleston
19 Carolina
19 California
15 Minnesota
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Luis Arroyave of the Chicago Tribune on his Red Card blog talks to former Argentina coach Jose Pekerman about why he was not interested in the USA managers position last fall when it was open. Good stuff.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

US Soccer has a U20 World Cup recap written by star forward Jozy Altidore.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Although he has been working for Bob Bradley for some time now, Mike Sorber has just been officially named an assistant coach for the USA men's national team.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Aston Villa has signed 18 year old American defender Eric Lichaj from Downers Grove IL.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The Chicago Trophy
Scores:
-Fri Jul 27
Reggina 1-1 Wisla - Reg goal by Cleber Delima(OG). Wis goal by Dariusz Dudka.
Sevilla 1-0 Toluca - Goal by Christian Poulsen.
-Sun Jul 29
Reggina 0-2 Toluca - Goals both by Vicente Sanchez.
Sevilla 0-1 Wisla - Goal by Andrzej Niedzielan.
-Wisla win the trophy with 4 points. Toluca 2nd with 3 & better goal difference, Sevilla with 3 in third, and Reggina last with 1 point.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

German preseason Liga Pokal
-Final:
Schalke 0-1 Bayern Munich - Goal by Miroslav Klose.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Asian Cup
Final:
Iraq 1-0 Saudi Arabia - Goal by Younes Mahmoud.
Post-game story from the New York Times.
Several more great stories & some video from Iraq, the Middle East and Jakarta on the Times soccer blog, Goal.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The Sylvain Wiltord transfer to Rennes has fallen apart, and now he is staying at Lyon. Go figure.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Mexican forward Nery Castillo will not be signing with Manchester City after all. He has signed instead with Shakhtar Donetsk in Ukraine.
-While at the same time. Man City has turned around and signed Shakhtar's best player - Brazilian midfielder Elano.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Arsenal beat Inter Milan 2-1 in the Emirates Cup match at their Emirates Stadium in North London. The Arse got their goals from Alexander Hleb & Robin Van Persie. David Suazo scored for Inter.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Blackburn has signed Paraguayan forward Roque Santa Cruz from Bayern Munich.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Lyon, who have won the last 6 French league titles in a row, have followed each of those up by winning the preseason Trophy Of Champions. This year they did it again beating Sochaux 2-1.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Sid Lowe at the Guardian writes about new Real Madrid manager Bernd Schuster.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It looks like Villareal have changed their mind and now want castoff midfielder Juan Roman Riquelme back from the loan to Boca Juniors.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

But top goal scorer Diego Forlan will not be at Villareal if Riquelme returns, because he has signed with Atletico Madrid.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The Observer with a story on how Walter Smith is attempting to rebuild Rangers.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

This weeks episode of the podcast from EPLTalk has an interview with Phil Lines, the Head of International Broadcasting & Media Operations at the Premier League. He talks about many things involving the English game and the future of it in America.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Finally Rob Hughes of the International Herald Tribune on a 113 year old unsettled match in Germany, and Freddy Adu.