Some News for Fri Jun 26
STARTERS
Big weekend, cuz not only is the Confederations Cup final this weekend, but we will also crown the Argentine champion!
CONFEDERATIONS CUP SOUTH AFRICA 2009
Twitter from Charlie Davies this afternoon: "Chillin in the hotel. Getting focused for the Final on Sunday vs Brazil! Is there any one better to play in a Final?" No Charlie, it does not!
dN
Final match:
-Sun Jun 28
USA v Brazil - 1:25pm Central on ESPN
dN
I think we can safely assume that Benny Feilhaber will move into the starting lineup against Brazil, replacing the suspended Michael Bradley.
dN
US Soccer has audio of press conference with coach Bradley and captain Carlos Bocanegra. Download or listen here.
dN
US Soccer also has video of players talking about the win over Spain.
dN
US Soccer give us the usual large file of pregame notes and facts. Love it.
dN
Grant Wahl of Sports Illustrated previews.
dN
AFP on the USA preparations for the rematch with Brazil.
dN
FIFA.com breaks down the 2 semifinal games with stats.
dN
The Guardian of Nigeria with quotes from US players, especially Michael Bradley again lashing out at USA critics some more. I have to say that MB's comments personally piss me off a little - he keeps referring to "everybody" and "nobody" and "no one", but I have always been a huge supporter, and for the most part very positive even on the bad days. There are many many more like me out there, and to be lumped in with people who take every chance to rip the team and coach is insulting. It's not nearly as definitive as he wants to make it out to be.
dN
CentralJersey.com with a post on their local boy done good - Coach Bob Bradley.
dN
Paul Gardner at Soccer America wonders if the USA win over Spain was the biggest in the team's history. What do you think?
dN
The AP points out some pretty strong connections to the state of South Carolina for this USA team. I was very surprised by this story.
dN
USMNT Official Blog
dN
Paul Oberjuerge ranks the top USA victories of all time. How does the win over Spain stack up? His #1 is a great one that many of us have forgotten to mention this week.
MLS
MLS Week 15 Matches:
-Wed Jun 24
Toronto FC 2-0 New York Red Bulls - TFC goals by Pablo Vitti & Dwayne De Rosario.
Venue: BMO Field
Attendance: 20,902
Colorado Rapids 1-1 FC Dallas - CR goal by Omar Cummings. FCD goal by David Ferreira.
Venue: Dick's Sporting Good Park
Attendance: 10,583
-Sat Jun 27
Columbus Crew v New York Red Bulls - 6:30pm Central on FSC & FSE
Venue: Crew Stadium
Real Salt Lake v Toronto FC - 8:30pm Central on Direct Kick
Venue: Rio Tinto Stadium
-Sun Jun 28
Seattle Sounders FC v Colorado Rapids - 3pm Central on Direct Kick
Venue: Qwest Field
Los Angeles Galaxy v Houston Dynamo - 9pm Central on ESPN2 & ESPN Deportes
Venue: Home Depot Center
dN
NY Sports Journalism does a Q & A with David Wright who is VP at MLS & their marketing arm known as Soccer United Marketing (SUM).
dN
DC has released goalkeeper Louis Crayton. He was with the team for 1 years, after signing to help a team that was in desperate goalkeeping trouble. But it seems now that Josh Wicks has upped his game and consistency to the point that Crayton is just a high paid backup, which doesn't fly in a league with such a tiny salary limit.
dN
For their game on Wed night Toronto FC wore pink shirts in support of the fight against breast cancer. Fantastic. The shirts will be auctioned off to raise money. I love it when teams do things like this. In another note, Argentine forward Pablo Vitti finally scored his first MLS goal. It was a beauty, so check out this video.
dN
Lance Hornby of the Toronto Sun on TFC at the midpoint of the season. Big win over New York puts them on the right track. If the season ended today they would make their first playoff appearance.
dN
Shawn Mitchell of the Columbus Dispatch on the Crew's slow build back to being the dominant force they were last season.
dN
Michael Arace also of the Dispatch writes about the return of Crew heart Frankie Hejduk to near full health. Arace has a formula for what is inside Frankie that makes him who he is, but Arace forgot the key ingredient that kicks it all off - megadoses of caffeine.
dN
Brian Lewis of the NY Post reports that the NY Red Bulls may be trying to sign another Colombian defender.
dN
Check it out, NYRB are finally going to get rid of the albatross known as Juan Pietravallo. A midfielder with extraordinary hacking skills, but sadly few soccer skills. The team bought him out of his contract. Fly away little birdy, fly free!
dN
For whatever reason both the Salt Lake Tribune and the Deseret News have articles this week on RSL full back Anthony Beltran who is making a name for himself this season.
dN
The Philadelphia Business Journal on the Union's search for big dollar sponsors.
dN
The Patriot News with an article on former DC United midfielder Josh Gros who is now working in the front office of the Union. It was all Peter Nowak's idea.
dN
Jeff Carlisle of Center Line Soccer reports that the San Jose Earthquakes have released veteran defenders Kelly Gray and Eric Denton.
dN
Thierry Henry spent a little time in New York this week working to raise money for Steve Nash's causes, so naturally the rumors explode again that Henry will come play for the Red Bulls.
dN
Doug McIntyre of ESPN Soccernet on the renewed bid by Montreal to join MLS.
dN
US Soccer gives us audio of the Week 14 Referee Review. Download or listen here.
USL FIRST DIVISION
My Minnesota Thunder announced an international friendly against Comunicaciones of Guatemala for Wed Jul 22 at the NSC Stadium in Blaine MN. Los Cremas have won the league title 22 times, making them the 2nd most successful club in that countries history behind Municipal who have won 26. Comunicaciones last won the league in the 2008 Apertura (Fall) season. Their current best known player is the great Costa Rican forward Rolando Fonseca. They call Guatemala City their home.
dN
This Week's Matches & Scores:
-Thu Jun 25
Charleston Battery 1-0 Puerto Rico Islanders
-Sat Jun 27
Cleveland City Stars v Austin Aztex
Carolina RailHawks v Puerto Rico Islanders
Minnesota Thunder v Rochester Rhinos
-Sun Jun 28
Portland Timbers v Montreal Impact
dN
Standings:
27 Charleston
25 Puerto Rico
24 Carolina
23 Portland
17 Rochester
17 Montreal
16 Miami
- - Out of Playoffs - -
15 Vancouver
11 Austin
9 Cleveland
7 Minnesota
SUPERLIGA 2009
Final Group Stage games this weekend.
dN
Official Site
dN
Matchday 3 Matches & Scores:
-Sat Jun 27
Chicago Fire v UANL Tigres - 7pm Central
Venue: Toyota Park – Bridgeview IL
Chivas USA v San Luis - 9pm Central
Venue: The Home Depot Center – Carson CA
-Sun Jun 28
New England Revolution v Atlas - 3:30pm Central
Venue: Gillette Stadium – Foxborough MA
Kansas City Wizards v Santos Laguna - 5:30pm Central
Venue: CommunityAmerica Ballpark – Kansas City KS
dN
All games are broadcast on Telefutura.
dN
Standings:
(After 2 of 3 Rounds Played)
Group A
6 Chicago Fire
3 UANL Tigres
3 San Luis
0 Chivas USA
Group B
4 New England Revolution
2 Kansas City Wizards
2 Atlas
1 Santos Laguna
CONCACAF GOLD CUP
The North & Central American and Caribbean confederation's championship tournament kicks off on July 3. Canada v Jamaica and Costa Rica v El Salvador start the proceedings.
dN
See all the games on FSC!
SOCCER IN AMERICA
Our friend Kartik Krishnaiyer of Major League Soccer Talk writes today about the role us bloggers play in spreading the love on the USA national team. I am very flattered to be mentioned in this article.
US SOCCER NEWS
The USA U20 team heads to Cairo, Egypt, and played a couple of friendlies against the hosts as a warm up before the World Cup in late September.
Matches:
-Sat Jun 27
Egypt v USA
-Mon Jun 29
Egypt v USA
dN
US Soccer has the team roster, and word that Mix Diskerud had joined the team. He has joint USA/Norway citizenship and has not decided where to put his senior team loyalties yet. He is said to be a promising midfielder. He plays his club football in Norway for Stabaek.
AMERICANS IN EUROPE
Martin Rogers of Yahoo Sports feels that the time is ripe for Landon Donovan to go to a league that would fit him perfectly - La Liga.
dN
Soccer 365 with the latest rumors on potential transfer deals. The Confed Cup has certainly raised the profile of several players.
MEXICO
The national team plays another Gold Cup warm up match, this time on Sun Jun 28 v Guatemala in San Diego.
SOUTH AMERICA
Marcela Mora y Araujo of the Guardian tells us about the huge problem that Argentine football is having at the hands of gangs. IE. Huracan's miracle season is being ruined.
dN
The title will be determined next weekend, with #1 traveling to #2. [Thanks to Timoteo for the correction on the date]
Argentine Clausura Championship:
(1 games left to go)
38 Huracan - Final Game: Sun Jul 5 at Velez Sarsfield
37 Velez Sarsfield - Final Game: Sun Jul 5 v Huracan
35 Lanus - Final Game: Sun Jul 5 at San Martin De Tucuman
COPA LIBERTADORES
Estudiantes of Argentina won their Semifinal first leg by the slimmest of margins and now have to play a huge game in the second leg to advance. Their star play Juan Sebastian Veron was reportedly injured in the 1st half and was subbed out at the break.
dN
Semifinals
1st Leg Matches:
-Wed Jun 24
Cruzeiro 3-1 Gremio - Cruz goals by Wellington Paulista, Porter Wagner & Fabihno. Grem goal by Souza.
-Thu Jun 25
Estudiantes 1-0 Nacional - Est goal by Diego Galvan.
2nd Leg Matches:
-Wed Jul 1
Nacional v Estudiantes (0-1)
-Thu Jul 2
Gremio v Cruzeiro (1-3)
Big weekend, cuz not only is the Confederations Cup final this weekend, but we will also crown the Argentine champion!
CONFEDERATIONS CUP SOUTH AFRICA 2009
Twitter from Charlie Davies this afternoon: "Chillin in the hotel. Getting focused for the Final on Sunday vs Brazil! Is there any one better to play in a Final?" No Charlie, it does not!
dN
Final match:
-Sun Jun 28
USA v Brazil - 1:25pm Central on ESPN
dN
I think we can safely assume that Benny Feilhaber will move into the starting lineup against Brazil, replacing the suspended Michael Bradley.
dN
US Soccer has audio of press conference with coach Bradley and captain Carlos Bocanegra. Download or listen here.
dN
US Soccer also has video of players talking about the win over Spain.
dN
US Soccer give us the usual large file of pregame notes and facts. Love it.
dN
Grant Wahl of Sports Illustrated previews.
dN
AFP on the USA preparations for the rematch with Brazil.
dN
FIFA.com breaks down the 2 semifinal games with stats.
dN
The Guardian of Nigeria with quotes from US players, especially Michael Bradley again lashing out at USA critics some more. I have to say that MB's comments personally piss me off a little - he keeps referring to "everybody" and "nobody" and "no one", but I have always been a huge supporter, and for the most part very positive even on the bad days. There are many many more like me out there, and to be lumped in with people who take every chance to rip the team and coach is insulting. It's not nearly as definitive as he wants to make it out to be.
dN
CentralJersey.com with a post on their local boy done good - Coach Bob Bradley.
dN
Paul Gardner at Soccer America wonders if the USA win over Spain was the biggest in the team's history. What do you think?
dN
The AP points out some pretty strong connections to the state of South Carolina for this USA team. I was very surprised by this story.
dN
USMNT Official Blog
dN
Paul Oberjuerge ranks the top USA victories of all time. How does the win over Spain stack up? His #1 is a great one that many of us have forgotten to mention this week.
MLS
MLS Week 15 Matches:
-Wed Jun 24
Toronto FC 2-0 New York Red Bulls - TFC goals by Pablo Vitti & Dwayne De Rosario.
Venue: BMO Field
Attendance: 20,902
Colorado Rapids 1-1 FC Dallas - CR goal by Omar Cummings. FCD goal by David Ferreira.
Venue: Dick's Sporting Good Park
Attendance: 10,583
-Sat Jun 27
Columbus Crew v New York Red Bulls - 6:30pm Central on FSC & FSE
Venue: Crew Stadium
Real Salt Lake v Toronto FC - 8:30pm Central on Direct Kick
Venue: Rio Tinto Stadium
-Sun Jun 28
Seattle Sounders FC v Colorado Rapids - 3pm Central on Direct Kick
Venue: Qwest Field
Los Angeles Galaxy v Houston Dynamo - 9pm Central on ESPN2 & ESPN Deportes
Venue: Home Depot Center
dN
NY Sports Journalism does a Q & A with David Wright who is VP at MLS & their marketing arm known as Soccer United Marketing (SUM).
dN
DC has released goalkeeper Louis Crayton. He was with the team for 1 years, after signing to help a team that was in desperate goalkeeping trouble. But it seems now that Josh Wicks has upped his game and consistency to the point that Crayton is just a high paid backup, which doesn't fly in a league with such a tiny salary limit.
dN
For their game on Wed night Toronto FC wore pink shirts in support of the fight against breast cancer. Fantastic. The shirts will be auctioned off to raise money. I love it when teams do things like this. In another note, Argentine forward Pablo Vitti finally scored his first MLS goal. It was a beauty, so check out this video.
dN
Lance Hornby of the Toronto Sun on TFC at the midpoint of the season. Big win over New York puts them on the right track. If the season ended today they would make their first playoff appearance.
dN
Shawn Mitchell of the Columbus Dispatch on the Crew's slow build back to being the dominant force they were last season.
dN
Michael Arace also of the Dispatch writes about the return of Crew heart Frankie Hejduk to near full health. Arace has a formula for what is inside Frankie that makes him who he is, but Arace forgot the key ingredient that kicks it all off - megadoses of caffeine.
dN
Brian Lewis of the NY Post reports that the NY Red Bulls may be trying to sign another Colombian defender.
dN
Check it out, NYRB are finally going to get rid of the albatross known as Juan Pietravallo. A midfielder with extraordinary hacking skills, but sadly few soccer skills. The team bought him out of his contract. Fly away little birdy, fly free!
dN
For whatever reason both the Salt Lake Tribune and the Deseret News have articles this week on RSL full back Anthony Beltran who is making a name for himself this season.
dN
The Philadelphia Business Journal on the Union's search for big dollar sponsors.
dN
The Patriot News with an article on former DC United midfielder Josh Gros who is now working in the front office of the Union. It was all Peter Nowak's idea.
dN
Jeff Carlisle of Center Line Soccer reports that the San Jose Earthquakes have released veteran defenders Kelly Gray and Eric Denton.
dN
Thierry Henry spent a little time in New York this week working to raise money for Steve Nash's causes, so naturally the rumors explode again that Henry will come play for the Red Bulls.
dN
Doug McIntyre of ESPN Soccernet on the renewed bid by Montreal to join MLS.
dN
US Soccer gives us audio of the Week 14 Referee Review. Download or listen here.
USL FIRST DIVISION
My Minnesota Thunder announced an international friendly against Comunicaciones of Guatemala for Wed Jul 22 at the NSC Stadium in Blaine MN. Los Cremas have won the league title 22 times, making them the 2nd most successful club in that countries history behind Municipal who have won 26. Comunicaciones last won the league in the 2008 Apertura (Fall) season. Their current best known player is the great Costa Rican forward Rolando Fonseca. They call Guatemala City their home.
dN
This Week's Matches & Scores:
-Thu Jun 25
Charleston Battery 1-0 Puerto Rico Islanders
-Sat Jun 27
Cleveland City Stars v Austin Aztex
Carolina RailHawks v Puerto Rico Islanders
Minnesota Thunder v Rochester Rhinos
-Sun Jun 28
Portland Timbers v Montreal Impact
dN
Standings:
27 Charleston
25 Puerto Rico
24 Carolina
23 Portland
17 Rochester
17 Montreal
16 Miami
- - Out of Playoffs - -
15 Vancouver
11 Austin
9 Cleveland
7 Minnesota
SUPERLIGA 2009
Final Group Stage games this weekend.
dN
Official Site
dN
Matchday 3 Matches & Scores:
-Sat Jun 27
Chicago Fire v UANL Tigres - 7pm Central
Venue: Toyota Park – Bridgeview IL
Chivas USA v San Luis - 9pm Central
Venue: The Home Depot Center – Carson CA
-Sun Jun 28
New England Revolution v Atlas - 3:30pm Central
Venue: Gillette Stadium – Foxborough MA
Kansas City Wizards v Santos Laguna - 5:30pm Central
Venue: CommunityAmerica Ballpark – Kansas City KS
dN
All games are broadcast on Telefutura.
dN
Standings:
(After 2 of 3 Rounds Played)
Group A
6 Chicago Fire
3 UANL Tigres
3 San Luis
0 Chivas USA
Group B
4 New England Revolution
2 Kansas City Wizards
2 Atlas
1 Santos Laguna
CONCACAF GOLD CUP
The North & Central American and Caribbean confederation's championship tournament kicks off on July 3. Canada v Jamaica and Costa Rica v El Salvador start the proceedings.
dN
See all the games on FSC!
SOCCER IN AMERICA
Our friend Kartik Krishnaiyer of Major League Soccer Talk writes today about the role us bloggers play in spreading the love on the USA national team. I am very flattered to be mentioned in this article.
US SOCCER NEWS
The USA U20 team heads to Cairo, Egypt, and played a couple of friendlies against the hosts as a warm up before the World Cup in late September.
Matches:
-Sat Jun 27
Egypt v USA
-Mon Jun 29
Egypt v USA
dN
US Soccer has the team roster, and word that Mix Diskerud had joined the team. He has joint USA/Norway citizenship and has not decided where to put his senior team loyalties yet. He is said to be a promising midfielder. He plays his club football in Norway for Stabaek.
AMERICANS IN EUROPE
Martin Rogers of Yahoo Sports feels that the time is ripe for Landon Donovan to go to a league that would fit him perfectly - La Liga.
dN
Soccer 365 with the latest rumors on potential transfer deals. The Confed Cup has certainly raised the profile of several players.
MEXICO
The national team plays another Gold Cup warm up match, this time on Sun Jun 28 v Guatemala in San Diego.
SOUTH AMERICA
Marcela Mora y Araujo of the Guardian tells us about the huge problem that Argentine football is having at the hands of gangs. IE. Huracan's miracle season is being ruined.
dN
The title will be determined next weekend, with #1 traveling to #2. [Thanks to Timoteo for the correction on the date]
Argentine Clausura Championship:
(1 games left to go)
38 Huracan - Final Game: Sun Jul 5 at Velez Sarsfield
37 Velez Sarsfield - Final Game: Sun Jul 5 v Huracan
35 Lanus - Final Game: Sun Jul 5 at San Martin De Tucuman
COPA LIBERTADORES
Estudiantes of Argentina won their Semifinal first leg by the slimmest of margins and now have to play a huge game in the second leg to advance. Their star play Juan Sebastian Veron was reportedly injured in the 1st half and was subbed out at the break.
dN
Semifinals
1st Leg Matches:
-Wed Jun 24
Cruzeiro 3-1 Gremio - Cruz goals by Wellington Paulista, Porter Wagner & Fabihno. Grem goal by Souza.
-Thu Jun 25
Estudiantes 1-0 Nacional - Est goal by Diego Galvan.
2nd Leg Matches:
-Wed Jul 1
Nacional v Estudiantes (0-1)
-Thu Jul 2
Gremio v Cruzeiro (1-3)
posted by brucio at 15:19
8 Comments:
good think Michael Bradley doesn't play for England.
he makes it sound like Bill O'Reilly spends every night calling for the coach's head.
Wow, does Michael Bradley come across as thin skinned and immature. Sure hope he was misquoted. We all know the blogs and boards include negative, absurd comments from a small minority of haters, eurosnobs and trolls. However, the vast majority of commenters are fair and want the best for the team. If Michael expects 100 percent, unconditional approval -- even when they put out a lackluster effort -- well, it is time for him to grow up.
A) Bradley sounds like a goof who watched too many NFL games where every single player in the locker room somehow has to buy into the whole "No one believed in us but us" meme, even if that's based on there being one sportswriter out there who said something negative.
That being said, that linked article from Nigeria is a fairly dubious source. Bradley is quoted as saying "our compatriots made us feel as if we were a bunch of idiots..." Seriously? Does any 21 year old American use the word Compatriots? 2ndly, Gooch was not born in Nigeria. He was born and raised in DC/Maryland.
But yeah, I think the bigger point is the less Bradley (the younger) talks to the media the better off we'll all be. Him most of all.
I agree about Bradley yelling at "everybody" - childish and, worse, unappreciative.
Sure, some people were saying that the performances of late were the result of just not very good players. Hey, of course we look bad and lose, they say, our players suck.
But a lot of other people were upset because we thought our players were better than what we were seeing on the field. We didn't like the 4-5-1s and the 4-3-3s. We didn't like the coming out uninspired.
Guess what? We were right that the guys could do better. And we're proud of them. But Bradley needs to learn the difference between supporting and coddling.
Bruce,
The Argentine Primera does not play until July 5th because of elections so it will not be decided this weekend.
Comunicaciones has been sending youth teams to the usa cup in blaine for years.
Cool that they're sending the big team.
thanks for the heads up timoteo, the place i get the game schedules from had it all wrong, but they have it right now, i always appreciate it when people can give us good info
i am going to go change the dates right now
Dude, I would take everything Bradley says with a grain of salt. He's an athlete, it's the kind of chip they have to have on their shoulders to be able to believe they can compete at high levels. There's a fancy psych term for it, but I'm blanking right now. Basically they create false adversities or false confidences in order to be able to feel invincible or unbeatable. His lashing out is caused by the same thing that gives him the balls to step on the field and shut down Xavi Hernandez. The same thing that allowed him to move from a MetroStar reserve to the Eredivisie and learn the language and score goals. Athletes are combative and sometimes for lack of a better term, ignorant creatures. Not because they are dumb, but because they have to have tunnel vision like that in order to survive and excel.
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