Category: Soccer America Daily

Fire ants, who attack and sting when their mounds are disturbed, have infested soccer fields in Chesapeake, Va., disrupting the season for hundreds of children in the Chesapeake United Soccer Club. Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services inspector Mike Tilley is working on an extermination plan.

Manchester City, which has won just two of its last 15 English Premier League games dating back to last season, suffered further embarrassment in the second round of the Carling League Cup, going down, 2-1, to third-tier Chesterfield. Claudio Reyna started and played 71 minutes wide left in the midfield for Man City while DaMarcus […]

The New England Revolution won 2-0 at New York on Wednesday despite the absence of midfielder Shalrie Joseph, who is out for the rest of the regular season with a hand injury. According to reports in the Boston Globe and SIcnn.com, Joseph hurt his hand last week during an altercation at a Boston nightclub. He […]

“Am I proud to be a general manager with less-than-stellar results happening on my watch? Absolutely not. Do I take it personally? Yeah. I don’t want to be associated with a team that doesn’t live up to the high standards the Galaxy has over the years.” — Alexi Lalas, who became president and general manager […]

Felix Magath, coach of German defending champion Bayern Munich, excused his players for a 2-1 league loss to lowly Arminia Bielefeld last weekend, citing the rigors of having to play German Cup and Champions League games the same week, but Magath’s boss would have none of that. Said Bayern chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, “It is imperative […]

When, last weekend, American DaMarcus Bealsey made his debut for Manchester City, a team nicknamed the Blues, he entered the field as a first-half sub wearing shiny red shoes. "Blue boots, you’d better wear blue boots," chanted the City fans. (They call soccer shoes “boots” in Britain.) Beasley came out after halftime wearing white shoes, […]

WEDNESDAY, ESPN2, 9 pm ET/6 pm PT “Once in a Lifetime: The Extraordinary Story of the New York Cosmos” The rise and fall of America’s greatest soccer club is chronicled in a documentary the New York Times described as, “Fielding heroes and villains, gentlemen and rogues, booze and women, it plays like the ‘Dynasty’ of […]

On Tuesday, the New York Red Bulls broke ground on the stadium scheduled to be completed in 2008. So far in MLS, Columbus, the Los Angeles Galaxy, Chivas USA, FC Dallas and Chicago play their home games in soccer-specific stadiums. The Colorado Rapids and future MLS club Toronto are set to move into new soccer […]

"We need stadiums in urban areas. We’re a little bit vanilla right now, our sport, and we’re going to get into communities that have a passion for the game. It is our charge to deliver the right environment for the fans and deliver the right product." — New York Red Bulls coach Bruce Arena at […]

For this week’s nationally televised games, including MLS and college action: https://www.socceramerica.com/article.asp?Art_ID=562137668

The USA, along with Canada, has qualified from the CONCACAF region for November’s 2006 FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup in Rio de Janeiro, where the Americans will face host Brazil, Japan and Poland in the group stage.At the qualifying tournament in Costa Rica, the USA lost, 3-2, to the host Ticos on Sunday after having […]

The U.S. U-17s beat their Guatemalan counterparts twice in three days in Bradenton, Fla. Guatemala, which aims to reach the U-17 World Cup for the first time in history, is coached by American Tim Hankinson, who coached in MLS in 1998-2004. Israel Sesay, a Sierra Leone native who recently obtained U.S. citizenship, scored twice for […]

GOALSCORING Jeff Cunningham (Real Salt Lake) 15 Ante Razov (Chivas USA) 14 Brian Ching (Houston) 10 Dwayne De Rosario (Houston) 10 Christian Gomez (D.C. United) 10 Jaime Moreno (D.C. United) 10 Carlos Ruiz (FC Dallas) 10 ASSISTS Terry Cooke (Colorado) 10 Jeff Cunningham (Real Salt Lake) 10 Christian Gomez (D.C. United) 9 FOULS COMMITTED Simo […]

Brazil is the best represented country in the European Champions League, based on the number of field players who saw action when the competition’s group stage kicked off. Thirty-two teams are vying for the title of Europe’s top club and in last week’s 16 games the 65 Brazilians who played accounted for 14.07 percent of […]

“I thought I was daydreaming for a second, honestly. But then I heard the crowd roar and thought, ‘Oh, shoot. That was me!’” — Josmer Altidore on how he felt after scoring the New York Red Bulls’ gamewinner last weekend against Columbus. The 16-year-old had seen 10 minutes of MLS action before coming on as […]

DaMarcus Beasley came on as a 35th-minute sub to make his English Premier League debut for Manchester City, which is loaning him from PSV Eindhoven. Claudio Reyna remained on the bench as Manchester City fell, 4-2, to Blackburn, whose keeper, Brad Friedel, was beaten on an own goal and a one-on-one. Beasley committed the foul […]

The weekend’s five MLS games produced as many red cards as goals – seven. In the one high-scoring game, Real Salt Lake prevented West leader FC Dallas from clinching a playoff spot with a 3-2 win in which Salt Lake got goals from Andy Williams, Chris Klein and Jason Kreis, whose seventh goal of the […]

"If I never play for England again then I’ve played 94 times and captained England for six years and have had an amazing time playing for England. I don’t want it to end, I want it to carry on. If I was a betting man I wouldn’t bet on me playing again – but who […]

The Vancouver Whitecaps and Charleston Battery moved into the semifinals of the USL First Division’s playoffs with victories in the first round of the playoffs. Vancouver knocked off expansion Miami FC, 6-1, on aggregate. Brazilian great Romario scored Miami’s only goal. Former MLS player Stephen Armstrong‘s second-half goal gave Charleston a 1-0 win at Puerto […]

Groundbreaking on the New York Red Bulls’ $200 million stadium project in Harrison, N.J., takes place this Tuesday. The project includes a 25,000-seat stadium scheduled to be ready in mid-2008. … Real Salt Lake has released a statement regarding its stadium proposal that includes: “We NEVER have — and we never will — propose taking […]

Finnish forward Shefki Kuqi’s switch from Blackburn Rovers to Crystal Palace almost fell through because, on the last day before the transfer deadline, a Rovers’ employee accidentally faxed the transfer forms to a fish and chips restaurant instead of the English Football Assocation. (There was only a one-digit difference in the number.) The FA accepted […]

Barcelona had never sold space on its players’ jerseys to advertisers even though other mega-clubs like Real Madrid and Manchester United earn about $35 million in annual revenue by turning their players into billboards. Now the Catalan team’s players are sporting a logo, but the club is paying, not accepting money. Ronaldinho & Co., now […]

The New England Revolution, which has scored just 30 goals in 27 games, has signed 33-year-old Mexican striker Jose Manuel Abundis. The former Mexican national team player scored six goals in 17 games during Toluca’s 2005 Apertura title run and over his career notched scored 92 goals in 305 Mexican League games. … New England […]

“I don’t necessarily agree with Sunil’s vision, but Sunil and I go way back, and I think he’s a real good person and he’s going to be a good president. He’s a competent person, and if my remarks infer that he’s not competent and a quality guy, that’s wrong. It’s the same with U.S. Soccer. […]

Referee Silvia Regina de Oliveira said she should have trusted her own vision and not her referee assistant when she awarded a goal to Brazilian club Santacruzense in its 1-1 tie with Atletico Sorocaba that was actually scored by the ball boy, who stroked home from a yard out. Click here for video of the […]