We Cover Most Regions News

See ya'll in KC on Saturday! I can't wait to watch some live game action!

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If you have Dish Network, Direct TV, or On Demand cable access, then you can watch the MLS Direct Kick package free this weekend. All the games live and direct to you!! But really you should just go buy it. It's an amazing value for $80.

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SF at the Offside Rules gives us our first look at the new MLS TV ad campaign.

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Nice hair dude: Kevin Hartman meet Ed Grimley.


MLS First Kick - This Weekend!

Matches & Scores:
-Sat Mar 29
Columbus v Toronto - 3pm central on Direct Kick
Salt Lake v Chicago - 5pm central on Direct Kick
New England v Houston - 6:30pm central on FSC
Kansas City v DC - 7pm central on Direct Kick
Colorado v Los Angeles - 8:30pm central on FSC
-Sun Apr 30
Dallas v Chivas USA - 2pm central on TeleFutura
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Note: for whatever reason both San Jose and New York do not play this weekend.
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MLS News

CHICAGO FIRE

Luis Arroyave of the Chicago Tribune takes a look at the Fire season ahead.
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Chicago's Daily Herald on Fire forward Chad Barrett who is one of those players who really needs to have a good season, for the sake of his career.
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Nick Firchau of Chicago's Southtown Star with an article on new(?) coach Denis Hamlett. He has been interim head coach twice before this.
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Len Ziehm of the Chicago Sun Times also writes about the new boss, Hamlett.
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Ziehm also writes about the mess the team is having with defender Wilman Conde who wants out.
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CD CHIVAS USA

Jonah Freedman of Sports Illustrated has a big story on forward Maykel Galindo.
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Chivas will be without captain Claudio Suarez against Dallas. His father has passed away and the Emperor has returned to Mexico to be with his family. RIP Senor Suarez, and our best thoughts to Claudio and his family.
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COLORADO RAPIDS

Martin Rogers of Yahoo Sports with an article on Colorado & Senegal goalkeeper Bouna Coundoul.
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COLUMBUS CREW

Shawn Mitchell of the Columbus Dispatch with a story on the biggest Crew talent, Guillermo Barros Schelotto.
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Mitchell also gives us his list of the best possible starting lineup for the Crew.
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And Mitchell talks to Crew Technical Director Brian Bliss who just returned from a scouting trip to Honduras.
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FC DALLAS

Buzz Carrick at 3rd Degree takes in a Dallas practice this week and reports back.
-Forward Ricardinho is definitely out this weekend due to an ankle injury.
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Drew Moor & Arturo Alvarez of Dallas are both out serving 1 game suspensions from the end of last season.
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DC UNITED

Craig Stouffer of the Washington Examiner says DC wants to be the top team in the whole hemisphere.
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Martin Rogers of Yahoo Sports takes a gaze at DC's Latin American corps. Wouldn't it be cool if they all spoke in Latin to each other on the field.
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Rod Dyachenko will miss the first DC game of the season due to a Red Card suspension from the end of last season.
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HOUSTON DYNAMO

Houston midfielder Ricardo Clark will start the season with 2 games still to be served on his 9 game ban for kicking Carlos Ruiz last year.
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KANSAS CITY WIZARDS

The Kansas City Star invites you to "Meet the 2008 Wizards".
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Dos Mundos in KC has an article on the teams new Colombian forward Ian Trujillo.
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LOS ANGELES GALAXY

Soccernet's Press Pass has a Q & A with Darnell Bongham.
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Jeffrey Marcus of the New York Times Goal blog with an article on El Pescado, Carlos Ruiz.
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New Brazilian midfielder Alvaro Pires aka The Buffalo received his work visa and is all set to go for opening day.
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NEW ENGLAND REVOLUTION

Frank Dell'apa of the Boston Globe with a nice big article on New England star defender Michael Parkhurst.
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Kyle McCarthy at the Boston Herald previews New England's season.
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McCarthy also writes about Rev's forward Taylor Twellman and how he is dealing with not getting his transfer to England.
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The winner of the season series between Columbus and Toronto will be awarded the Trillium Cup. Trillium, is that the name of those fuzzball characters that multiplied really fast on the original Star Trek show?
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REAL SALT LAKE

James Edward of the Deseret Morning News looks at the hard nosed players RSL accrued this offseason.
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The Salt Lake Tribune with an article on RSL's talented youngsters.
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And the SLT has a season preview of the team too.
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The Daily Utah Chronicle previews Real's new season.
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And The DUC also previews this weekends opening game v Chicago.
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TORONTO FC

Ben Knight of the Toronto Globe & Mail's On Soccer blog is riding with TFC fans in the buses headed to Columbus for Saturday. His Monday articles should be fantastic. He is saying upwards of 2500 are making the trek.
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Morgan Campbell of the Toronto Star previews TFC's season with this haunting headline: "TFC kicks off with new coach and that's about it" Ouch. He writes that they have added 2 new senior roster players to that crappy team!!! TWO! Could that be right? What is going on? Can you imagine Chivas USA standing put with that horror team they had in year 1. Isaac Romo anyone?
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Jimmy McNulty of the Toronto Sun with pretty much the same tale of stale on the TFC roster.
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The Sun also has an article on forward Jeff Cunningham who had a throw away season for the most part last year.
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The winner of the season series between Toronto and Columbus will be awarded the Trillium Cup. Trillium, is that the toxic chemical element used to strengthen metal and causes cancer if you breathe too much of it in?
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The mayors of Toronto & Columbus also have a bet where the loser has to wear the winning teams jersey to work one day.
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GENERAL

Ives Galarcep at Soccernet gives us previews of all 6 games this weekend and also writes about the new foreigner players in the league.
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Jeff Carlisle at Soccernet with a full MLS season preview.
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Soccernet gives us their preseason Power Rankings.
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Like a bolt of beautiful sunlight Shaka Hislop debut's on the pages of the Guardian with a MLS season preview. Yessir!.
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Frank Dell'apa of the Boston Globe on the new group of owners coming into the league - they have a lot of moolah.
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Dell'apa also previews the season, team by team.
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The Boston Herald also previews the league.
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Fox Soccer Channel with separate Eastern Conference - and - Western Conference previews.
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Luis Arroyave of the Chicago Tribune hands out the 5 big post season awards before we've even played a minute.
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Ives Galarcep of Soccer By Ives predicts the league award winners too.
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Shawn Mitchell of the Columbus Dispatch with the 5 biggest issues from the league this year.
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FIFA.com has a league preview.
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Goal.com highlights the key/crucial games on the schedule this season.
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The Staff at Goal.com make their season predictions.
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Goal.com gives us Week One match-by-match previews.
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Goal.com also has an article by player Kelly Gray who has signed with Colorado. Who knew that had happened? I pay close attention and I never saw that anywhere. Anyway, he writes his column again at Goal.com.
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Grahame Jones of the LA Times draws comparisons between MLS and the EPL.
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Jonesy also talks to MLS chieftain Donny G about the near future for the league.
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David Keyes at the Culture of Soccer gives us his 2008 season preview.
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Luis Bueno at Sports Illustrated looks at the results so far from the Designated Player rule.
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Ridge Mahoney of Soccer America looks at the former MLS players that are slowly but surely taking over the running of the leagues teams.
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On Beau Dure's blog The Netminder he links to a really cool MLS world map showing the native countries of every player in the league! Awesome.
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Steve Pastorino at the US National Team Players Assoc blog names a coach and first 11 players that he is looking forward to watching this season.
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Steven Goff of the Washington Post with separate Western and Eastern Conference previews, and then an overall look at the growing importance of the international market to the league.
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MLS Expansion News

Several people have alerted me to the fact that the 3 name choice being put to the public by the new team in Seattle are not the ONLY choices. You can also write in a name. The official candidates are Seattle FC, Seattle Alliance & Seattle Republic. What kinda choices are those? Of course the big scuttlebutt is that everyone should do the write in vote and go with the old traditional Sounders name. I can live with that or not. (thanks to everyone who tipped me off to this)
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Jeff Gammage of the Philadelphia Inquirer gets us an update from Philly on season ticket sale (OVER 3400 ALREADY!) and stadium etc etc.
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MLS Friendlies

Matches & Scores:
-Fri Mar 28
Portland (USL1D) v San Jose in Portland, OR at the Clive Charles Soccer Complex
Carolina (USL1D) v New York in Cary, NC at the Wake Med Soccer Park
-Tue Apr 8
San Luis (FMF) v Chicago in Mexcali, Mexico at Estadio Casas GEO
-Tue May 13
Vancouver (USL1) v Los Angeles in Edmonton, Alberta at Commonwealth Stadium
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San Jose & New York are playing exhibition games on Friday because they don't have an opening weekend game.
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USL First Division & PDL News

Here is a snap shot of the new Minnesota Thunder shirt for 2008. From that small picture it looks pretty sharp. Here is another picture, this time of a player in the full uniform. See that pic and more at Blue Sky Soccer thanks to BQ.
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Rochester has hired former player Darren Tilley as their new coach replacing the Salty Sea Captain Lawrie Calloway.
-The Rochester Democrat & Chronicle has a story on his first day on the job.
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Soccer In America

Sports Illustrated has launched a new website called SI Vault where you can go back and see all the articles and picture etc that hey have published since day one in 1954. Let's go find those cool and very rare old soccer stories.
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Americans In Europe

Freddy Adu's team Benfica has officially approached Manchester United assistant coach Carlos Queiroz about becoming their next head man.
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The 14 team Norwegian Tippeligaen kicks off this weekend with 5 Americans taking to the fields:
-Brian West at Fredrickstad
-Troy Perkins at Valerenga
-Aidn Brown & Pat Noonan at Aalesund
-Brain Waltrip at Molde (newly promoted)

And we also have:
-Clarence Goodson at Start in the Norwegian Adeccoligaen (2nd Division).
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The 16 (up from 14) Swedish league Allsvenskan starts this weekend too, and 3 Americans are involved there:
-Colin Burns at Ljungskile
-Charlie Davies at Hammarby
-Tally Hall at Esbjerg
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CONCACAF World Cup Qualifying

2nd leg Qualifier Matches & Scores (with 1st leg scores included):
-Sun Mar 30
British Virgin Islands v Bahamas (1-1)
Cayman Islands v Bermuda (1-1)
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Ben Knight from the Toronto Globe & Mail On Soccer blog asks what Canada was doing playing a game in the snows of Estonia as they prepare to take on teams from Central America in qualifiers.
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Mexico & FMF News

Only 3 more days until the Mexican federation honchos meet and decide the near future fate of coach Hugo Sanchez.
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South American News

4 players from Peru including top talents Jefferson Farfan & Claudio Pizarro have been banned from the national team for 18 months for unspecified disciplinary reasons.
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Copa Libertadores

Group Stage Matches & Scores:
-Mar 25
Coronel Bolognesi 0-0 Cienciano
Maracaibo 1-1 Atlas - Mar goal by Dario Figueroa(PK). Atl goal by Bruno Marioni
San Lorenzo 1-0 Bamin Real Potosi - SL goal by Adrian Gonzalez
-Mar 26
Liga Dep Univ Quito 6-1 Arsenal - LDUQ goals by Patricio Urrutia, Damian Manso, Luis Bolanos (2), Claudio Bieler & Alfonso Obregon. Ars goal by Luciano Leguizamon.
River Plate 2-0 Universidad Catolica - RP goals by Radamel Falcao Garcia & Sebastian Abreu.
Dep Univ San Martin 1-0 America - DUSM goal by Mario Leguizamon.
-Mar 27
Cucuta Deportivo 1-0 Chivas Guadalajara - Cuc goal by Matias Urbano.
Boca Juniors 4-3 Colo Colo - BJ goals by Martin Palermo, Leandro Gracian, Rodrigo Palacio & Neri Cardozo. CC goals by Gustavo Biscayzacu (2) & Rodolfo Moya.
Danubio 2-0 Deportivo Cuenca - Dan goals by Damian Malrrechaufe & Alejandro Lembo.
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Group Stage Standings
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European News

There is a story in every English publication today about the two owners of Liverpool having a serious difference on opinion on their future with the team. I am going to link to any, cuz there are so many and they all say the same things we have been reading for weeks if not months on end.
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With only four games remaining PSV can win the Eredivisie title for the 4th straight year this weekend. If they beat NEC Nijmegen on the road and Ajax lose to Heerenveen on the road, it's all over.
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Everton has lost their best player Tim Cahill for the rest of the Premiership season due to a broken metatarsal bone (in the foot). This is becoming THE soccer injury isn't it.
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Juventus & Italy goalkeeper Gigi Buffon is going to sit out the rest of the Serie A season as soon as Juve clinch a Champions League spot. He has a bad back and wants to be rested for the Euro championship this summer.
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The Guardian wonders, if Rangers could only focus on one of the league title or the UEFA Cup, which one should get the nod.
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Reuters blog ponders a big question - is Ronaldinho done at Barcelona?
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The Telegraph has a great article on a Canadian doctor who has a serious Everton Fixation.
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James Lawton at the Independent says that the one player England coach Capello most needs to get untracked for the national team to succeed is Wayne Rooney.
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Euro League Cup Competitions

Final of France's Coupe de la Ligue:
-Sat Mar 29
Paris Saint Germain v Lens
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Big Euro Club Matches This Week

Matches & Scores:
-Sat Mar 29
Rangers v Celtic - the top dogs and old Firm. If Celtic win they will be tied at #1.
Villarreal v Atletico Madrid - #3 hosts #4!
Lazio v Inter - Will Roma's hated neighbors help them get closer to Inter at the top?
Bordeaux v Nancy Lorraine - #2 v #3, with first place nearly out of reach for either.
Besiktas v Fenerbahce - #4 v #1 in Turkey, but only 2 points separate them.
AEK Athens v Olympiacos - #3 (five points back) hosts #1 with only 4 rounds left to play
Derby v Fulham - the Death derby - the two worst team in England go to battle.
-Sun Mar 30
Liverpool v Everton - the Merseyside derby, and the winner gets 4th place aka the last Champions League spot.
Real Madrid v Sevilla - RM desperately need to win to stay on top, while Sev need to get into the Champions League spots for next year.
Anderlecht v Cercle Brugge - the old traditional powerhouse v the young upstarts while both try to stay close to the leaders.