By Ridge Mahoney
Senior Editor, Soccer America
Manchester United released Kenny Cooper Jr. not solely because cutting him loose would enable him to sign with MLS.
The league announced yesterday he is headed for Dallas, where he attended high school and his father, Ken Sr., played for the NASL's Tornado. According to Steve Kelly, an agent who is currently working for the Canadian Soccer Association as well as independently, United is preparing to offer a lucrative contract to New Jersey-born Giuseppe Rossi, who has scored four goals for the first team this season and has also reiterated his preference to play for Italy rather than the USA.
A blizzard of speculative media reports aside, nothing has changed from last year, when Sigi Schmid — then the U.S. under-20 coach — contacted Rossi about playing for the USA.
Rossi declined, and also declined a call-up from U.S. coach Bruce Arena last October. Rossi, 19, has apparently been told by the Italian soccer federation that he is in their plans for the national team following the upcoming World Cup and he's willing to wait to see if a call-up is forthcoming.
If not, he can always opt for the USA. Because of his Italian parentage, he is exempt from non-EU player limits and work-permit benchmarks imposed by the Professional Footballers' Association and British Home Office.
Cooper, 21, holds British and U.S. citizenship. He hasn't been able to crack the United first team and played on loan with Oldham Athletic and in Portugal with Academica Coimbra. As Jovan Kirovski has shown, scoring goals for Man United Reserves isn't a guarantee of greatness, either in MLS or anywhere else.
Yet FC Dallas Coach Colin Clarke scouted Cooper several times and as a former international forward surely knows what he's getting. Cooper was acquired by the discovery process; each team is permitted to sign six such players each season.
ADU RETURNS. Amid rumors he's bound for Chelsea, Freddy Adu left the U.S. training camp and resumed training with D.C. United, which has issued a statement denying any transfer discussions are being held.
Adu has declared his best course of action is try to earn a regular starting spot for his club team. This is news?
Perhaps it took nearly a month with the national team for Adu to believe what Arena has been repeating since he took over the U.S. team after the 1998 World Cup: excel for your club and you'll get a shot.
He may have also realized just about every player in the U.S. camp is well ahead of Adu in development and his learning curve is still rather steep.
And for a kid who doesn't turn 17 until a few days before the 2006 World Cup kicks off, no matter how talented he is, the pronouncement of Arena that ''Freddy is doing just fine'' isn't mollification. It's truth.
Players respect Arena for how he manages them and his handling of the Adu furor is a case in point. Impatience is youth personified. The kid wants to kick butt now. Good for him. Time is on his side.
CLOSED DOORS. The former offices of the San Jose Earthquakes officially closed last week. Whatever isn't being shipped to Houston has either gone into storage or has been otherwise removed.
Only the canopy remains of a two-time league champion. Uniforms and other gear are being stashed until the team can be revived, although the San Jose City Council on Monday abandoned a very farfetched, dubious $80 million proposal that had been discussed with MLS.
The council's own members had scuttled the financial underpinnings by refusing to endorse a reallocation of city recreation funds for a pro team.
A source says that Spartan Shops, Inc., which has managed Spartan Stadium, will not run the facility after March 1. The university will take over maintenance and operations of the 73-year-old facility, which hosts San Jose State football and soccer games, and the nearby Events Center.
Disputes between Anschutz Entertainment Group and Spartan Shops over lease terms and revenue distribution had triggered AEG threats to move the team unless the facility was renovated or a new one was built, and those threats finally came to be.
MLS Commissioner Don Garber met with city officials last week to discuss options. San Jose doesn't have prospective owners, a plan for a facility, or political backing, but it does have jerseys.