Some Soccer News for Dec 16, 2016

It's Day 351 of 2016.


Deep inside the MLS expansion draft room of Minnesota United. By Paul Tenorio of Four Four Two.

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Bruce Arena disclosed a few of his USMNT January camp invitees during a Facebook Q & A today:

• Juan Agudelo, DaMarcus Beasley, Benny Feilhaber, Matt Hedges, Kekuta Manneh, Dax McCarty, Darlington Nagbe, Chris Pontius, Keegan Rosenberry, and Walker Zimmerman

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MLS announced their plan on how they will expand from 24 teams to 28 teams by 2022.

• The current Top 10 cities for potential expansion:

Charlotte
Cincinnati
Detroit
Nashville
Raleigh-Durham-Cary
Sacramento
St Louis
San Antonio
San Diego
Tampa-St Petersburg

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Shaka Hislop gives his opinion on MLS and what this expansion mean for American soccer. With Dan Thomas of ESPNFC. [VIDEO]

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Does this one break new ground? Here is the semi-regular "I can fix the MLS playoffs" article. By Brian Straus of Sports Illustrated.

• I prefer a single leg bracket with higher seeds hosting each game. IE: The top 4 (2 in East + 2 in West) get a buy in Rd 1 while teams 3-6 in East + West playoff for 4 spots again with the higher seed hosting. Then with 8 teams left we get E1 hosting the lowest E seed left etc. This rewards regular season records.

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In the year 1100AD, yes 1100, E St Louis had a giant pyramid and 30,000 residents! https://t.co/ko3VF8xBVH

— Bruce McGuire (@dunord) December 15, 2016

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After 2 seasons in exile American midfielder Joe Corona is back with Tijuana. Good for him.

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Why does everyone in Germany hate RB Leipzig? By Simon Evans of the Washington Post.

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Pure-bred Roman - Its year 23 at Roma for Francesco Totti and he is not ready to be done. By Rory Smith of the New York Times.

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The Bob Bradley + Swansea City Tracker:
Standings - 18th Place, 3 Points and -8 GD into relegation
Up Next - Sat Dec 17 at Middlesbrough

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Nominees for The CONCACAF Awards
Male Player of the Year:
Christian Bolanos - Costa Rica + Vancouver Whitecaps
Clint Dempsey - USA + Seattle Sounders
Javier Hernandez - Mexico
Bryan Ruiz - Costa Rica
Hirving Lozano - Mexico + Pachuca
Wes Morgan - Jamaica
Keylor Navas - Costa Rica
Christian Pulisic - USA
Romell Quioto - Honduras + Deportivo Olimpia
Rubens Sambueza - Mexico + Club America

Female Player Of The Year:
Janine Beckie - Canada + Houston Dash
Shirley Cruz - Costa Rica + Paris Saint-Germain
Crystal Dunn - USA + Washington Spirit
Tobin Heath - USA + Portland Thorns
Carli Lloyd - USA + Houston Dash
Alex Morgan - USA + Orlando Pride
Mallory Pugh - USA + Real Colorado
Becky Sauerbrunn - USA + Kansas City
Christine Sinclair - Canada + Portland Thorns
Karla Villalobos - Costa Rica + Union Deportiva Moravia

• You can vote here for these 2 awards and many others.

• In classic CONCACAF fashion no date was announced for when the winners would be announced.

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Coming up this weekend in Europe:
-Fri Dec 16
Hoffenheim v Dortmund - #4 v #6 - 1:30pm CT on FS1
-Sat Dec 17
Juventus v Roma - #1 v #2 - 1:45pm on beIN Sports
Leipzig v Hertha - #2 v #3 - 8:30am CT on FS1
-Sun Dec 18
Man City v Arsenal - #4 v #3 - 10:00am CT on NBCSN
Barcelona v Espanyol - The Barcelonian Derby - 1:45pm on beIN Sports
Monaco v Lyon - #2 v #4 - 1:45pm no USA TV
-Mon Dec 19
Everton v Liverpool - The Merseyside Derby - 2:00pm CT on NBCSN



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