*snerk*

United Dong longs to prove critics wrong

The bored Soccernet headline writer strikes again!

Friday linkpost

• Liverpool win their fourth preseason friendly. Interesting, though, that (I believe) Torres hasn't scored yet. Hopefully this is just him taking a little bit of time to warm up.


• Dudek's really going to Real. I have to say, I don't understand this deal at all. I know he was basically the Cup keeper last season, but he didn't really do well when he did get to play. Whatever; he's finally gone. He burned through his Istanbul credit really fast for me, and I think he should have probably gone in January 2006.


• Totti retires from international play. I don't know how much they'll miss him -- he's always been a better club player than international, but I do like him.


• And two stories I am sick of: Beckham not likely to play against Chelsea tomorrow, and no one knows who controls Carlos Tevez's contract. Ugh. I feel like we've been hearing about these since last year. Over it.


• And finally today, this is perhaps the most clueless marketing I've ever seen. Soccer is hard! Boys are cute! Um, which US team has won the World Cup again? (Thanks to Jen for the link.)

Speaking of the shallow end

Quiz time! Here we see:

a) a farmer-tan convention
b) the US Copa team

The second annual end-of-season awards

Yes, Footie Girl and I are doing it again. Yes, we realize that the Premiership is already pretty much back in season, with friendlies and summer tours and meaningless cup competitions. But like everyone always says, the season's not over till Argentina choke in a major way, so here we are. Some of the categories have changed since the last time -- different season and all that. Anyway. With apologies for the delay, here are the Second Annual Footie Girl and You'll Never Blog Alone End-of-Season Awards!

Chav of the Year: Steven Gerrard. While his wedding wasn't quite as gloriously tacky as we'd all been hoping for, the best man's toast tipped the scales all the way over to chav. It takes a lot to have a tackier wedding than John Terry (Lionel Richie, that's all I'm saying), but Steven managed. Good job, kid.

Runner-up: Rio Ferdinand. For the Myspace page alone.

Most Valuable Spaniard: Pepe Reina. He had a good season overall, really, but basically, this award comes down to one thing: penalties. I've never really seen an alleged "penalty specialist" who lived up to the hype like Pepe does. I don't have a lot to say here, since the video really speaks for itself. Basically, though, our keeper's a total fucking stud, and maybe the best buy Rafa's made.

Runner-up: Cesc Fabregas. Scored basically no goals, but really grew into his central midfield role, and grew up enough (apparently) to be Arsenal's new vice-captain. Stop throwing pizza and see where it gets you, kids?

Most Emo Player: We've got a tie! This one goes to both Jose Antonio Reyes and Julio Baptista. Either Arsenal is really awful, or Reyes and Baptista both need to get a sunlamp or two and just deal with it. It's not like Real Madrid was the happiest place on earth, either.

Runner-up: Andriy Shevchenko. Left Milan in the summer, and pretty much immediately started batting his eyes at them again. Now he might go back, he might not, but ugh. We're over it.

Clusterfuck of the Year: England. Runaway winners in this category, especially after Real inconveniently ended up winning La Liga. For the analysis here, I'm just going to quote Footie Girl: "For the entire World Cup fiasco, the endless process of replacing Sven that ended up with ... Steve McClaren (woo), dropping Becks and then bringing him back, the ongoing attempts to shoehorn Steven and Lameass into the same midfield, the failed experiment with 3-5-2, etc., etc." Add in the incredibly lackluster, and likely doomed, Euro qualification campaign, and you've got a big old mess, and one that's not going to get better anytime soon.

Runner-up: Chelsea. There are so many links I could dig up here, but I'll just go for this one.

Gayest Team: Italy. The Internets are being remarkably uncooperative with photographic evidence right now, but come on. Gattuso was pretty much naked before they even laid hands on the trophy, and apparently the Italian way to congratulate your keeper for winning a penalty shootout is to straddle his crotch. Not that we're against either of those things.

Runner-up: Arsenal. Still and forever.

Best Fight: Craig Bellamy, John Arne Riise, karaoke and golf clubs. Everyone's heard about this one by now, but it's still awesome. The facts alone are probably enough for this to win, but the part where these two idiots -- and I say that with love -- went on to score in the Barcelona game? Seals the deal. I don't want to say it was ironic, but it was at least Alanis Morrissette ironic.

Runner-up: Inter/Valencia. Like, play with that much energy and one of y'all would probably have scored.

Douchebag of the Year: Mike Newell. Knowing that you're a sexist doesn't make it any less douchey, sunshine. (Yes, I did just call Mike Newell "sunshine." He's lucky that's all I'm calling him.) We would also like to take this opportunity to point out that Rachel Yankey wins. Unlike Mr. Newell or his team.

Runner-up: Jose Mourinho. No new links, but basically he gets this for everything he's ever said at a press conference ever. Also getting arrested over a dog.

Special Achievement Award: Daniel Agger. We'd like to be all high-minded here and say that this is for his goal against West Ham. Or even for his goal against Chelsea, which was less pretty but more important. But we have to be honest. Those helped, but this is really because somewhere along the line, Dan got hot. If this makes us shallow, we can live with that.

That's all for this season's awards! Hopefully next year they'll be done before preseason.

Aw,

Railhawks beat Chicago Fire 1-0 to advance to Open Cup quarters. Aw. Good job, boys. Maybe I can actually make it to the game next time. This one doesn't sound like it was much of a thriller, but knocking out the holders is always a pretty sweet feeling. Just ask Arsenal about that FA Cup match.

Sorry, y'all, this is what you get when Liverpool's boring me. (Babel's a good signing, but I know nothing about him, and I can't get worked up about friendlies.) Consider yourselves lucky I'm not talking about the u20s anymore.

And it's better than a camera on Donovan.

This is lame, but odds are I'll watch.

And, really, train a camera on Zidane for an entire game and you've got yourself an art film, so who knows. Let's call it nationally broadcast installation art. Who knew ESPN was so pomo?

Well, and also, I can't mock Chelsea if I don't watch them. So there's two reasons.

Friday linkpost

• Sid Lowe (in Spain) looks at Torres' move to Liverpool. I've pretty clearly missed the boat on commenting on this transfer, but I'll just say I'm refraining from judgment until the season starts, at least. It's nice to see us get a more traditional striker, and I've liked him internationally, so I'm optimistic.


• Speaking of transfers, Cisse's going to Marseille for good. It's about damn time, I say. I didn't like him when he was here, and I don't think we missed him when he was out on loan last season. Maybe he'll do better in France, but meh. Mostly I'm just glad we're clearing out some dead weight.


• And he's taking Zenden with him. Thank god. That's really all I've got on this one.


• Finally, my last word on the US at Copa America. I agree with a lot of this post, but honestly. The US's performance was pretty much a disaster. Not one they could have done a lot to prevent, but three-and-out shouldn't be something they're okay with.

I blame Footie Girl for this.

Because instead of writing about the Torres deal (thumbs up!) or Rafa's new facial hair (thumbs down!), I'm being forced to defend the US's team selection for Copa America. Note: this is not defending their performance, because I can't do that. They lost concentration and allowed Argentina back into the game, and their finishing was absolutely dire against Paraguay. But those were both problems during the Gold Cup too, and so I don't think that's really down to team selection. Given the constraints they had to work under -- club commitments, fatigue, and the need to win the Gold Cup -- I don't think the team selection was that bad. And it certainly wasn't bad enough to be singled out by CONMEBOL.

The general criticism of the Copa America squad is that it was second-tier and too inexperienced; usually people argue here that Bob Bradley or US Soccer or whoever should have picked the more experienced internationals for Copa America and let the younger players handle Gold Cup. But that's based on a misunderstanding of current priorities, and, I think, a desire for prestige now instead of later. While I think everyone would agree that Copa America is the more prestigious tournament, it's also not entirely relevant to the US's immediate goals. Winning it -- which they were never going to do, even with their strongest squad -- would have gotten them nothing in terms of the Confederations Cup or financial reward. Copa America is essentially a no-stakes tournament for the US. Even the best result for them would have been pretty much meaningless, like winning a friendly. While getting to the quarters, or even further, would have been nice, that's all it would have been. For better or worse, the US is in CONCACAF, and I don't think you can fairly blame them for the weakness of the conference. In the short term, winning their conference tournament still has to be the priority, since it gets them both immediate rewards (money) and future payoff (Confederations Cup, and more international experience).

Therefore, since there was no real benefit to winning, it seems like the US decided to treat Copa America as essentially a practice tournament, calling up next-generation players and a few more established ones. One of the things they were faulted for after the World Cup was only playing against weaker teams, which hurt them when they got drawn into one of the tougher World Cup groups. Well, again, it's not the US's fault CONCACAF is weak, and they're absolutely required to play Gold Cup. But now a lot of the players likely to be in the mix for 2010 (assuming qualification) will have experience against more quality teams. So, yeah, this is really a developmental squad, but I don't think that's necessarily bad. In addition, it's not like the US is the only country who took that approach. Brazil, a CONMEBOL team, exempted its two best players and took a more untried team as well. And yet the US are the only ones getting called out by CONMEBOL. Doesn't make a lot of sense.

Finally, you have to look at the issue of availability. Since Copa America isn't the conference tournament for the US, releasing players for it was optional on the part of their clubs. Especially with European clubs starting training so early, this meant that many of the more experienced players had to return, like Dempsey, Howard, and Bocanegra. So the US was, I think, hampered to a large extent by the fact they were only invitees to the tournament and not required to play, unlike Brazil, Argentina, and the other CONMEBOL teams. (And even that doesn't take into account the fatigue issues present in playing two tournaments back-to-back.) In addition, the u-20 World Cup started immediately after the Gold Cup ended, which meant that some of the more experienced younger players like Michael Bradley and Freddy Adu were committed to that instead. So even if they had wanted to pick the exact same team as for Gold Cup, there was no way they would have been able to. (A side issue here is that there don't seem to be a lot of mid-level players; people tend to either have 30+ caps or under 10. I don't know why that is, but I blame Arena.)While I agree it's a significantly weaker team than I would have liked, I think it'll pay off in the long run. A lot of the players in the Copa America team now will be in their mid-20s by the next World Cup, which is when it'll really matter.

Managerial wife swap!

(What can I say -- I'm sick to death of the "managerial merry-go-round" headlines. Let's change it up a bit.)

Uh. I don't dislike Coleman, but. What? I'm not sure this was the best decision for Sociedad.

And speaking of bad decisions... Not that I love Capello, but this is weird. And seems like an odd way to reward someone for winning the league. Not in the most stylish fashion, true, but can Real really afford to be so picky, considering it was their first trophy in three seasons? They think they can, I guess, and that's all that matters. Maybe we can get a switch going -- Capello to Chelsea, Jose to Barca, Rijkaard to, um. Somewhere else. That's where it all falls apart.


Liverpool? Still haven't bought anyone. Though I do like these Torres rumors. A lot, if we're being honest.

Pretend this is embedded

Dorkiest national team ever? Signs point to yes. But stuff like this makes me wish more teams had Youtube channels. (And before any of y'all say anything, I totally love Benny Feilhaber for his mind.)

Anyway, enjoy winning, boys. Just don't get used to it. Copa America will be rough.

Bad news, good news

First, the bad news. Charlton are shutting down their women's team. The justification is supposedly that they need the money because the men were relegated. And that may be their reason, but it doesn't make a lot of sense regardless:

Despite their relegation, Charlton will receive parachute payments of £11million a year for the next two seasons, while the impending sale of Darren Bent to Tottenham is set to bring in £16m.

Killing the women's team will only save them about 250,000. Which they could get from selling a youth player or two. It's ridiculous, and really disheartening. Charlton are one of the most successful teams in English women's football, and they don't deserve to be shut down because the men couldn't cut it this year. So basically, this is complete bullshit, and I hope they can find a way to keep the team alive.

And now the good news:

• US 2 - Chile 1 (U20 men, friendly). I didn't get to see all of this one, but this is a good way to warm up for the U20 World Cup, starting next week in Canada. They've apparently drawn the Group of Death (again), so this should be interesting.


• US 2 - Brazil 0 (women, friendly). I watched all of this one, and god. How badass is Kristine Lilly? More national team appearances than anyone ever -- not anyone in the US, or any woman, but anyone. Admittedly, this was an under-strength Brazil team, but the US completely dominated this one. It bodes well for the Women's World Cup, I think.


• US 2 - Mexico 1 (men, Gold Cup final). This was the only competitive match of the three, and the one I was most invested in. The first half wasn't all that impressive -- Onyewu had an absolute shocker throughout, and they missed far too many chances. With that, though, things got a lot better in the second half; the defense tightened up and they were able to retain possession better. Ching and Beasley still threw away too many chances, but I can't really criticize too much. They did what they needed to, and Feilhaber's goal was absolutely gorgeous. I have a thing for long-range shots like that, and that was just about perfect. The most important thing here is that they qualified for the Confederations Cup in 2009, which should build some confidence. Now comes the Copa America, where they'll probably crash and burn. But it's good that they're going, and it should be some good experience for the younger players and the MLS-based ones. But, man, I fear that Argentina squad.

Is it can be transfer tiem now?

Because nothing is happening in Liverpool's off-season (in that we have not bought anyone at all, really), and all I seem to be able to talk about these days is uniforms and the US national team, today I bring you an article about both.

Now, this really annoyed me more than it should have, and I'm not entirely sure why. I'm, at best, a casual US fan, and even then it's during off-summers when there's nothing else going on. But, come on. Even I know that every team has a third kit. Also, even countries where they have a consistent home shirt -- he uses Argentina and the Netherlands as examples -- change those kits. Not as drastically, but they change. As nice as it would be to have some FA totally immune to the whims of Adidas or Nike, it's not going to happen anytime soon.

This, though, is ridiculous:

[After beating Colombia in the 1994 World Cup] Perhaps betraying a lack of confidence, the Americans changed uniforms for this game—an odd move for a host country.

HI THAT IS CALLED BEING THE AWAY TEAM. Even if you're playing a tournament in your home country, every team has to have an away kit, because you always have a home and an away. This is why Milan had to wear white and Liverpool got to wear red in Athens -- even though neither team was native to Greece, you always have a home and an away. If the US was "away" for that game, they were away. It's not a crisis of faith to change shirts when you're required to.

Also, I refuse to take anyone seriously who advocates for this kit. Leaving aside the blue shorts with stars, really? Red and white hoops? They'd look like candy canes. Or candy stripers. Neither of those are really likely to inspire confidence, I don't think. (Also, he seems to have this thing for fans wearing the team's jerseys. Imagine the average American sports fan in horizontal stripes. Yeah, that's totally a good idea!) Or this one. They all look like they're regional finalists in the Miss Teen USMNT pageant with that sash thing. And, seriously. You've got to know Michael Bradley's got that title sewn up, since he is, in fact, a teenager (though Donovan could make a late run for it, since he's a girl). Anyway. Those are both, while not absolutely horrendous, certainly not the best kits in the world, and the first one is more than likely going to get anyone laughed off the pitch.

And I actually really like the current kits. The stripe is simple, but the colors are strong, and I really like how the stripe carries down the shorts and the socks as well. It's not iconic like the Netherlands kit, but it doesn't really have to be. American soccer has really only been around in its current form for about 20 years. Give them time and they'll work something out.

God, Liverpool, will you hurry up and sign someone already? My posts can't get much more frivolous than this.

Friday linkpost

• Steven Wells defends American soccer. And in the Guardian, no less! I would like to co-sign everything he said. (And, really, isn't it long past time everyone got over the word "soccer"? I'm officially sick of that discussion.)


• The Stevens Report finally comes out. Wait, Bolton's dirty? I am shocked.


• Daniel Agger wins goal of the season for Liverpool. Apparently the fans are immune to shots from inside our own half now. Too bad for Xabi.


• Soccernet evaluates the US team as they head into the Gold Cup quarters. I didn't know Bradley had played everyone on the roster. It'll be interesting to see who gets to start tomorrow, with that in mind.


• And finally, Steven Gerrard, Gary Neville, and Michael Carrick all get married tomorrow. Not to each other. Though that would probably be more interesting. If they don't have thrones at the reception, I just can't quite bring myself to care too deeply.

Lazy Thursday blogging

First of all, hi to Soccerblogs and Seven Guys Short! I've been using Soccerblogs for a while now, and Seven Guys Short is new to me, but I wish I'd been reading sooner.

Second, the Premier League released the fixture list for the upcoming season. Here's Liverpool's schedule (pending Champions League qualifiers, cup replays, and, as always, life-threatening fog.) This is nice, in that it puts us all a little closer to the start of the new season, but it's still two months away. I know some people get really excited about this, but I'm not really one of them, I guess. Didn't we know that every team plays every other team twice? But it's the off-season, and Liverpool's not setting the transfer market on fire at the moment (Benayoun? Huh), so you blog with what you have. If you want a real look at the calendar, though, Sven's got it covered.

Speaking of off-season boredom, I seem to have fallen into watching the US men in the Gold Cup. I'm not entirely sure how this happened, really, but I think I blame their friendly against China. While Landon Donovan is, sadly, in the team -- I admit he's skilled, but I just do not like him -- they retained a lot of the younger players from the China game as well. So it's the US, but it's a different look for the US, and one I like a lot more. I think getting their asses absolutely handed to them at the World Cup last year, after going in ranked in the top ten by FIFA, was a really humbling experience. A lot of the players from that side have retired or are aging out, and Bob Bradley seems to be focusing on bringing in a lot of European-based players, which is only good for the team in the long run, I think. I'll be interested to see how they do in Copa America, where they'll be facing much better opposition than in the Gold Cup. The fact that they're even going to Copa America, after turning down invitations for years, is nothing but a good sign; even if they have to play a weakened team, getting more players in the rotation and playing more challenging internationals is worth it.

As far as the Gold Cup, the US was apparently in "el grupo de la muerte" -- sorry, I don't get Fox Soccer, so I've been watching on Spanish TV -- but qualified for the quarters with a game to spare, and absolutely destroyed El Salvador 4-0 in their final group game. So far, it doesn't seem like they've really been tested, though the first game, against Guatemala, was pretty scrappy. Like I said, it's good to see the new boys getting a lot of playing time, and I continue to like the midfield with Feilhaber and Bradley together in the center. Twellman's goal was absolutely gorgeous as well, and the whole team seems to be working pretty well, I think. They meet Panama in the quarterfinals Saturday, and yeah. I'll be watching en vivo.

In slightly related news, I'm about 93% certain that Bob Bradley is a robot. It's the steely eyes that do it.

The opposite of transfer speculation

First of all, this is a pretty nice little article about the Carolina Railhawks from the local indie weekly. (Named, cleverly, the Independent Weekly.) I'm going to my second USL game tomorrow night, and it's good to see them getting media coverage. The Triangle seems to love its minor league sports, and hopefully that'll hold true for soccer as well. Also, like I mentioned before, that game against Chivas was indeed awesome.

Second, in Liverpool news, Pepe signed until 2012. I never really thought that he was likely to leave, even with Valencia supposedly sniffing around, but I'm glad we have that confirmed. Of course, this leaves the question of his backup open, but Scott Carson's probably coming back from loan, so maybe that will work out.

Also in non-transfer news, Xabi Alonso and Momo Sissoko are supposedly going to sign new deals as well. As far as I'm concerned, the sooner this happens, the better, especially for Xabi. He doesn't seem like the sort of player to do that whole Steven yes-but-no-but-yes thing, but the rumors have been persistent, and pretty credible, that a lot of clubs are interested. Even though he had sort of an off season, Liverpool doesn't really have another player with the same skills, so while I'm happy that they seem to be close to a deal, I can't really rest easy until it's signed. And Momo is good, too, though I wonder what we're going to do with him and Mascherano. It's always good to have cover, though.

Finally, Alexi Lalas really needs to quit while he's behind.