Going Real Fast, But With Patience News

Could Michael Bradley become the American Michael Ballack? Bradley scored again last night in Heerenveen's 5-1 win over Venlo. what an amazing season he is having - 13 goals so far in all competitions.


MLS News

Can you believe that MLS pre-season kicks off this weekend?!?! MLS with details on what we can expect this pre-season and regular season.
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Mike Biglin of the MetroWest Daily News and Frank Dell'apa of the Boston Globe on the departure on Rev's forward Pat Noonan to Aalesund in Norway.
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New England announced that they have re-signed defender/midfielder and former team captain Joe "lil Frankenstein" Franchino.
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Adam Spangler of This Is American Soccer has part 1 of a great Q & A with Robert Abramowitz - Editor In Chief of Futbol Mundial magazine (among a million other things he does).
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Clemente Lisi of the US Soccer Players Assoc has a Q & A with New York Red Bulls coach Juan Carlos Osorio.
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Both John Haydon of the Washington Times and Steven Goff of the Washington Post today's DC United South American signing - Gonzalo Martinez, defender from Colombia.
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Andrea Canales at Soccer365 with an article on Houston defender Eddie Robinson, who at 29 years old made his debut with Team USA last weekend. He played 45 minutes, and scored a goal!
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FC Dallas Updates with Part 2 of a fan Q & A with Dallas general manager Michael Hitchcock and coach Steve Morrow.
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Michael Black of the Deseret Morning News talks to new Salt Lake defender Ian Joy.
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Bob Luder of the Kansas City Star on the departure of Wizards forward Eddie Johnson to Fulham in England.
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Johnson's home town paper the Daytona Beach News Journal with the story too. With quotes from his mom.
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Tobias Xavier Lopez with an article on finding, nurturing and most importantly keeping young talent in MLS.
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The "Supplemental Draft" will be held this afternoon via conference call. This is a chance for teams to pick up any players that were not chosen last week in the Superdraft.
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Big Apple Soccer reports that the Red Bulls will hold a pre-preseason training camp next week for all draft picks and free agents.
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Bernardo Fallas of the Houston Chronicle feels that the Dynamo need to look far and wide to replace departed forward Joseph Ngwenya.
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The awesome Colorado supporters group Class VI put together a drive to send soccer balls to kids in Iraq. One of their members is stationed there and set it up on that end. Well done!
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Morgan Campbell of the Toronto Star says TFC has brought in a bunch of French players to try out for their academy & senior teams.
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Dean McNulty of the Toronto Sun says TFC coach Mo Johnston is going to do everything he can to convince Joseph Lapira to sign with Toronto instead of a European team.
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The Seattle Times is reporting that MLS Seattle has hired long time MLS player Chris Henderson as their Technical Director.
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Univision's reality show/contest last year uncovered Jorge Flores for Chivas USA. He won the contest, got a contract, made the squad, and even played! He also got a call up to the USA U20 team! What an amazing story. This year Univision is gonna do it again, and this time 2 teams will search for a star - Chivas USA & Dallas. The show starts this weekend and is part of the Republica Deportiva program.
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MLS Rumor City

American Soccer Daily is reporting that Houston forward Nate Jaqua has been offered a deal by Altach in Austria. The other night on Glenn Davis's Houston based radio show he said that Jaqua also has had a try out with the same Austrian club that just signed his Houston teammate Joseph Ngwenya - Karnten.
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DC United is very very close to finalizing a deal for Millonarios defender Gonzalo Martinez.
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Guatemala & Municipal midfielder Freddy Thompson is being looked at by a couple of MLS teams.
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Luis Arroyave of the Chicago Tribune on the Fire's chase for French striker Fabrice Pancrate from Sochaux.
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Jeff Cooper the potential owner of a new MLS team in St Louis has brought a team into the newly announced Women's Professional Soccer league, and they will be called St Louis United. Does this mean the same name could be extended to his MLS team if they happen? More likely it means he is using this name for his women's team and will find a new name for his men's team, so as not to conflict with DC United. But I will state once again that calling your team United is lame if you have united anything.
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USL - First Division

Vancouver has signed keeper Jay Nolly and forward Nicolas Addlery, both formerly of DC United.
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USA

The team is back in Carson CA for training leading up to the Mexico game on Feb 6. Roster from US Soccer. Several more players from European teams will be added to this team and then a game day roster will be chosen from all of them.
-4 guys from the previous roster headed to Florida this week to train with the Olympic team: Jozy Altidore, Maurice Edu, Sacha Kljestan & Marvell Wynne. Any or all could be called back for the Mexico game.
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USA Olympic Team

They are currently in an extended training camp in Bradenton Florida.
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Jozy Altidore checks in from Florida via the New York Times Goal blog.
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Mexico's Olympic team will play 2 warm up games before the qualifying tournament:
-Sun Mar 2 v Australia in Oakland at McAfee Coliseum
-Thu Mar 6 v Finland in Frisco TX at Pizza Hut Park
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Americans In Europe

Michael Bradley is just tearing it up at Heerenven in the Dutch Eredivisie. He scored last night for the 3rd match in a row. The team sit in 4th place, only 6 points from the top, but they have 2 games in hand over Feyenoord who sit one point behind them. What a run!
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Soccer America with a story on Bradley today.
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US Soccer has a video interview with Eddie Johnson about his transfer to Fulham.
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Martin Rogers of Yahoo Sports with his look at the Eddie Johnson transfer. He offers up some helpful pointers.
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Some fine artwork here showing us the all new Team America forming up at Fulham. (thanks to Brian at Oz City for this gem.)
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Ravi Ubha at Soccernet with a story on the still shining American goalkeeper Brad Friedel of Blackburn.
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Tim Howard & Everton were knocked out of the English League/Carling Cup last night in a 1-0 home loss to Chelsea, and 3-1 on aggregate. They had already been eliminated from the FA Cup so now they focus on the league race, and the UEFA Cup which resumes in a couple of weeks.
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Scotland's Press & Journal with an article on Notre Dame striker Joseph Lapira who looks to be skipping MLS to go on trial with Aberdeen.
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The Twin Cities (my cities) Metro Player Of The Year is Keido Pour from St Bernards. And this week he is in Germany on a trial with Borussia Dortmund. His plan is to finish school here, and return to a European team this summer.
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European Cup Competitions

English League/Carling Cup - Semifinals
2nd Leg Matches & Scores (with 1st leg scores included):
-Tue Jan 22
Tottenham 5-1 Arsenal - Tottenham advance to final 6-2 on aggregate.
-Wed Jan 23
Everton 0-1 Chelsea - Chelsea adv 3-1 on agg.
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So the Carling Cup final will be Tottenham v Chelsea on Sun Feb 24 at Wembley Stadium.
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Copa Italia - Quarterfinals
1st leg Matches & Scores:
-Wed Jan 23
Udinese 3-2 Catania
Sampdoria 1-1 Roma
Inter 2-2 Juventus
-Thu Jan 24
Lazio v Fiorentina
-2nd leg matches next week.
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Spanish Copa del Rey - Quarterfinals
1st leg Matches & Scores:
-Wed Jan 23
Getafe 1-0 Mallorca
Valencia 1-0 Atletico Madrid
-Thu Jan 24
Racing Santander v Athletic Bilbao
Villareal v Barcelona
-2nd leg matches next week.
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European News

Scotland has officially named George Burley as their new national team manager.
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The Guardian gets us all caught up to date with the Turkish league.
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Reuters Soccer Blog with an article on Valencia coach Ronald Koeman who is trying to save his job-team-season. Why does there seem to be a high level of paranoia involved?
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Jonah Freedman of Sports Illustrated with the latest World Soccer Club Power Rankings. No change at the top.
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The Times tells us the secret to success of Tottenham coach Juane Ramos.
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African Cup of Nations
Group Stage Matches & Scores:
-Sun Jan 20
Ghana 2-1 Guinea
-Mon Jan 21
Namibia 1-5 Morocco
Nigeria 0-1 Cote D’Ivoire
Mali 1-0 Benin
-Tue Jan 22
Cameroon 2-4 Egypt
Zambia 3-0 Sudan
-Wed Jan 23
Tunisia 2-2 Senegal
South Africa 1-1 Angola
-Thu Jan 24
Guinea 3-2 Morocco - Guin goals by Pascal Feindouno(2) & Ismael Bangoura. Mor goals by Hicham Aboucherouane & Abdeslam Ouaddou.
Ghana 1-0 Namibia - - goal by Junior Agogo.
-Fri Jan 25
Cote D’Ivoire v Benin
Nigeria v Mali
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Moments after scoring his 2nd goal for Guinea today Pascal Feindouno kicked a player from Morocco and was Red Carded!
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Greg Lalas at Goal.com does a Q & A with Ghana forward Junior Agogo.
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Lalas also writing for Sports Illustrated with a story on Ghana coach Claude LeRoy.
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After seeing all the teams once, Sulaiman Folarin is calling Cote d'Ivoire the favorites to win it all.
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The Times The Game blog says that new Manchester United signing Manucho lived up to the hype when he scored a goal for Angola yesterday.
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The AP is reporting that a man approached the Benin coach and asked him to help rig the outcome of the game v Mali. Via Sports Illustrated.
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Business Day in South Africa on the countries last minute gasp for 1 point yesterday.
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Vanguard with an article on the fans of Nigeria who are flipping out on coach Berti Vogts. Even their own Federation is slamming him.