Author Archives: Soccer America

Europe’s soccer governing body says it will decide in September if Poland and the Ukraine are fit to host Euro 2012.

Spain’s 28-year-old Barcelona midfielder Xavi Hernandez won the Euro 2008 Player of the Tournament award. The 23-man ‘best of Euro 2008’ roster includes nine players from champions Spain.

The Columbus Crew’s veteran Argentine midfielder, Guillermo Barros Schelotto, has shown many fine touches since arriving in MLS last year. He’s also not been slow to express his exasperation at the shortcomings of some of the players around him.   Saturday was a case in point. According to Shawn Mitchell, the first-half efforts of Nigerian […]

FIFA President Sepp Blatter admitted Sunday that he has a “Plan B” should South Africa be unable to host the 2010 World Cup, “but it will only be used if a disaster makes holding the tournament impossible there.”   Speaking in Vienna before the Euro 2008 final, Blatter said he would be “negligent as president […]

Sunday’s game between D.C. United and the L.A. Galaxy promised rich entertainment thanks to the array of storied offensive talent on display. Not only that, writes Pat Walsh, it was going to feature United’s Zach Wells and L.A.’s Steve Cronin, “the worst two goalkeepers in MLS.”   But the weekend’s highest scoring Major League Soccer […]

Paul Wilson’s only quibble with Euro 2008 is that too few people saw the games live because of the relatively small capacity of all but two of the stadiums. But the tournament should be remembered not just for the entertaining games and some unexpected results, but also for “an uncommonly low number of referee’s whistles.” […]

There’s barely a soccer journalist alive who doesn’t think that Spain deserved to win the European Championship Sunday, its first title for 44 years. The Spanish won the final with a moment of brilliance that epitomized their “flair, panache and style,” writes Sam Wallace. Fernando Torres’ sweet winning goal “was the moment when their brightest […]

Bob Kimball talks to TV analyst Andy Gray, taking a three-week working break in Bristol, Conn.

Jack Bell analyzes the swift return of the man who took Italy to the 2006 World Cup title.

Draw for the fourth phase of Asian World Cup qualifications puts North and South Korea in the same group again.

Soccer’s conspiracy theorists love to claim that their team lost a World Cup only because a particular game was fixed in favor of an opponent, usually the host nation. The 1978 competition, hosted and won by Argentina at a time when the country was ruled by military dictatorship, usually attracts the most attention in such […]

The next Homeless World Cup takes place in Melbourne in December, but tryouts for the U.S. team take place in Washington, D.C., this weekend, reports Mike Wise. He caught up with some of the 100 hopefuls vying for a spot on the eight-man roster that will travel to Australia later this year.   That includes […]

The uncertainty over the true capabilities of the German team has dogged them throughout the tournament, and will follow it into Sunday’s final against Spain. Goalkeeper Jens Lehmann embodies this insecurity as much as any other German player — against Portugal in the quarterfinal he looked to be in the world-class form that won him […]

“Yet another cameo of utterly bewitching football” from Spanish substitute Cesc Fabregas was the key to Spain’s 3-0 European Championship semifinal win over Russia, writes James Lawton. After all the pre-game talk of Russia’s canny Dutch coach Guus Hiddink and his midfield conjurer Andrei Arshavin, “Spain struck out for the destiny that they always believed […]

The English Football Association announced Friday that it will ban competitive soccer leagues for under-8s from next season in order to help improve skills and technique among young English players. FA officials said “the pressure to win leagues was more often for the satisfaction of parents and coaches than the children,” writes Anil Dawar. The […]