Monthly Archives: October 2007

Midfielder Ricardo Clark, one of the defending MLS champion Houston Dynamo’s key players and a player with a bright future on the U.S. national team, was banned for nine games — an MLS record — and fined $10,000 after a violent kick on Guatemalan Carlos Ruiz during last Sunday’s FC Dallas-Houston game.

[TV PREVIEWS] Soccer America’s Ridge Mahoney breaks down the action in MLS, which begins Friday when Kansas City hosts D.C. United. It’s gut-check time for the Wizards and the Fire, who can solidify if not confirm postseason reservations by winning at home, and must-win time for skidding homies Columbus and Colorado. The Galaxy takes its improbable but not impossible playoff quest to Houston, and the 2005 expansion teams renew their unique rivalry in Utah. Toronto has a whole lot of Mo’mentum after beating RBNY.

If New York coach Bruce Arena told his team it had to break its recent trend of tying three straight games, 2-2, the message came through garbled. Poised again to clinch a playoff spot by winning, again the Red Bulls faltered. They scored an own goal and had a player ejected as ex-New York right back Marvell Wynne and his mates took them down, 2-1, at BMO Field in front of the usual cacophonous crowd of red-clad crazies and a national TV audience.

[MLS STATS] With three games left, D.C. United’s Brazilian striker Luciano Emilio is the first MLS player to score 20 regular-season since Carlos Ruiz (24) and Taylor Twellman (23) did in 2002. With three more strikes Emilio would tie D.C. United’s single-season record, set by Raul Diaz Arce in 1996. The MLS record is 27, set by Roy Lassiter while with Tampa Bay in 1996. The second leading scorer this season is another South American newcomer: New York’s Juan Pablo Angel

[TV PREVIEW] As they survey BMO Field and see the crowd and hear its passion, the players, coaches and officials of Red Bull New York must wonder if it will ever come to pass for them, this seemingly ideal melding of location, facility, and fandom. Red Bull Park is still years away. League games in the Meadowlands are ridiculously expensive and drained of atmosphere, except for the nine-goal appearance of David Beckham in early August.

The two men most responsible for the rebirth of the San Jose Earthquakes weren’t in attendance, but those who were there- including former Clash and Quakes defender John Doyle, who was named Wednesday as the team’s new general manager – heaped praise upon Oakland A’s co-owners John Fisher and Lewis Wolff, the money men behind the MLS expansion team. “I think a lot of it comes back to local ownership,” says A’s president Michael Crowley, who will fill the same role for the Quakes. “The team that was here previously never had that and I think you need that in any sport, baseball or soccer or whatever sport you name. Or whatever business you name, for that matter.”