Category: Story
Posted inSoccer America Daily, Story

Plenty to prove for USA at Gold Cup

by Ridge Mahoney

Just about everybody connected with the U.S. team as it heads into the Gold Cup tournament this week has something to prove, from the head coach right on down to his son. Bob Bradley is replacing Bruce Arena, the most successful coach in U.S. history. His son, Michael, is one of several candidates vying to replace former captain Claudio Reyna in the middle of midfield. A slew of defenders, from MLS as well as abroad, are in the wake of Eddie Pope, who manned the back line for a decade.

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First-timer Guadeloupe taps into pipeline

by Paul Kennedy

[GOLD CUP PREVIEW] Like Martinique, which played in three Gold Cups, Guadeloupe is an overseas French department with a population of 450,000, so it is ineligible for FIFA competitions like the World Cup. But the French departments are CONCACAF members and compete at a high level within the Caribbean. Many high-profile French stars have roots in Martinique and Guadeloupe. Guadeloupe, this year’s only first-time entrant, is tapping into that pipeline of current and former European-based pros for the Gold Cup.

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Red Bull Alert at Toronto’s BMO

by Ridge Mahoney

[TV PREVIEW] The roughest stretch of the season is underway for the New York Red Bulls, and they started poorly with a 3-2 loss in Kansas City Saturday. Clint Mathis was ejected for elbowing Kerry Zavagnin in the throat and he could get an extra game tacked onto his suspension, which would rule him out of NYRB road tests Wednesday at Toronto and Sunday at D.C. United. Counting the KC game, NYRB plays six of seven on the road. In any case, Mathis won’t be on the field at BMO Field tonight, when the Red Bulls (5-2-2) meet an expansion team that dropped its first four matches but has rebounded with three wins, a loss and a tie in its last five games. TFC left back Kevin Goldthwaite is also suspended.

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Dynamo departures challenge defending champ

by Ridge Mahoney

Striker Brian Ching may be mired in a slump, yet his departure to join the U.S. team for the Gold Cup couldn’t be more poorly timed for Houston coach Dominic Kinnear. Dwayne DeRosario, who despite his struggles leads the Dynamo with three goals, is with the Canadian team, and Ching hasn’t scored since netting two – his only two goals this season – against Colorado a month ago.

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Haiti has hometown edge in Group A

by Paul Kennedy

[GOLD CUP PREVIEW] Haiti will be the home team in Group A at Miami’s Orange Bowl. For Haiti’s first ever game at the Gold Cup in 2000, a crowd of almost 50,000, most of them Haitian supporters, turned up at the Orange Bowl to watch the USA beat Haiti, 3-0. Haiti enters the Gold Cup as arguably the hottest team in CONCACAF. Its victory in the Digicel CUF Cup final in January touched off wild celebrations in Port-au-Prince. (Its U-17 team qualified for this summer’s world championship in South Korea, knocking out defending world champion Mexico, in one of the biggest upsets in CONCACAF history at any level.)

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Canada has strong MLS flavor

by Paul Kennedy

[GOLD CUP PREVIEW] The Gold Cup was the scene of Canada’s greatest achievement of the last 20 years. Indeed, its 2000 Gold Cup victory stands as the only bright spot for a program that has languished and fallen far behind its North American rivals, the United States and Mexico. The national team program is in transition. It hasn’t had a full-time head coach since Frank Yallop left a year ago to return to MLS as the coach of the Los Angeles Galaxy. Dale Mitchell won’t take over as his replacement until after the U-20 World Cup in Canada. Interim coach Stephen Hart will coach Canada at the Gold Cup. Canada has a considerable pool of talent to draw upon from overseas and now in MLS

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Medford sets sights on Costa Rica’s first Gold Cup title

by Paul Kennedy

[GOLD CUP PREVIEW] Costa Rica is a team in transition. Gone is Coach Alexandre Guimaraes, who led the Ticos at the 2002 and 2006 World Cup and will coach Panama at the 2007 Gold Cup. Star Paulo Wanchope announced his international retirement after the 2006 World Cup and is now playing for FC Tokyo in Japan.

Former Costa Rica star Hernan Medford leads the Ticos in his first major international tournament as national team coach. For the Gold Cup, Costa Rica will be at close to full strength with 11 holdovers from the 2006 World Cup and four players based overseas, including former Los Angeles Galaxy defender Pablo Chinchilla, who now plays in Austria.

Posted inSection 2 Around the Net, Story

Transfer Truths and (Mostly) Rumors

by Soccer America

The summer transfer season is certainly underway. Fresh speculation is in the air, as players, coaches and agents alike all make suggestions about their futures and the futures of their clients and teammates. The most interesting U.S.-related news of the day was Chelsea midfielder Claude Makelele’s suggestion that MLS could be in his future. “The […]

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Interview: Clarence Seedorf

by Soccer America

FIFA.com has an interview with AC Milan midfielder Clarence Seedorf, the only man to have won the UEFA Champions League with three different teams. He’s won the prestigious competition four times, first with Ajax Amsterdam in 1995, then Real Madrid in 1998 and now twice with AC Milan, in 2003 and 2007. Club teammate Paolo […]

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Fairy Tale Ends Ugly for T&T

by Soccer America

A year ago, the Soca Warriors of Trinidad & Tobago were heroes. After snubbing Sweden with a 0-0 draw and nearly achieving the same result against England, the tiny Caribbean nation-the smallest ever to qualify for the World Cup-stamped itself on the world soccer map. A hero’s welcome awaited the players as they returned from […]

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Wynne at Home in Toronto

by Soccer America

Mo Johnston had big things in mind when he drafted Marvell Wynne to the then-MetroStars as the No. 1 overall pick in the 2006 MLS SuperDraft. He thought: this is a guy you could build your defense around. Wynne, too, was excited — but then several things happened. First, the MetroStars were bought by Red […]

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Estonian Soccer Still on the Mend

by Soccer America

Soccer as a symbol of oppression: it’s not a common theme across the globe, but nevertheless, the game that’s usually synonymous national and regional identity inevitably manages to get mixed up in domestic politics somehow. Jonathan Wilson says that soccer and ice hockey became “outsider” sports in Estonia once the Baltic nation lost its independence […]

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Brazilian Campos on fire for PDL’s Fuego

by Soccer America

[PDL RESULTS] Brazilian Pablo Campos scored two goals for the Fresno Fuego in a 4-2 win over the Lancaster Rattlers to give him a league-high 10 goals in seven games. Only seven teams remain unbeaten: the defending champion Michigan Bucks (4-0-2) and Indiana Invaders (2-0-2) in the Great Lakes Division; Kansas City Brass (4-0-0) and Thunder Bay Chill (1-0-1) in Heartland Division; Hampton Roads Piranhas (4-0-1) and Ocean City Barons (4-0-0) in Mid Atlantic Division; and Cape Cod Crusaders (3-0-3) in Northeast Division. For complete PDL results and goalscorers …

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Tiny Liechtenstein is on a roll

by Paul Kennedy

With a population of 33,000, Liechtenstein does not even have its own pro league — its top club, FC Vaduz, was tied for eighth in the Swiss Second Division — and has never finished anywhere other than last in its group of a major qualifying tournament, but it finds itself on a roll going into Wednesday’s Euro ’08 qualifier against Spain in Vaduz. Liechtenstein has earned four points in its last two games: a 1-0 win over Latvia — only its second win in European Championship qualifying — followed up by a 1-1 draw away to Iceland on Saturday that left Latvia last in the group.

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Ryan cuts women’s residency squad to 24 players

by Soccer America

With the countdown to the Women’s World Cup on, U.S. national team head coach Greg Ryan has reduced the residency training camp roster to 24 players. Ryan released forwards Lauren Cheney and Megan Rapinoe and goalkeepers Kristin Luckenbill and Kim Bingham, while injured players Heather Mitts and Amy LePeilbet, both defenders, and goalkeeper Jenni Branam will not be healthy in time for the Women’s World Cup.

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USSF shakes up youth landscape

by Mike Woitalla

The U.S. Soccer Federation is launching the U.S. Soccer Development Academy, which promises to dramatically decrease the men’s national team program’s dependence on the Olympic Development Program to identify players. The Federation has started accepting applications from the nation’s elite youth clubs to run academy teams for U-16 and U-18 boys to compete in the academy’s regional leagues. Up to 80 clubs will be chosen by U.S. Soccer’s national team coaches to run academy teams. Players in the academy program will not take part in ODP. To counter the “growing trend of clubs playing an excessive quantity of games in lieu of consistent training patterns,” academy teams will not play in any other leagues, tournaments or State Cup competitions. Players will only be allowed to compete on their designated academy team (with exceptions for high school soccer and national team duty). The Federation says ODP, which is run by U.S. Youth Soccer and state associations, will continue “unimpeded” because the spots opened up academy players who won’t take part will be filled by additional players.
The Federation released several documents pertaining to the new program that will provide opportunities for more than 2,000 players:
Academy Overview, On the Field Details, Academy Presentation, Membership Application for clubs.

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U.S. Soccer Development Academy: The Impetus

by Mike Woitalla

Shortly after being elected U.S. Soccer President in March of 2006, Sunil Gulati launched a complete review of all the Federation’s technical areas. The Technical Committee, headed by Kevin Payne, concluded that on the youth player development front, at ages 13 to 17, elite players needed an increase in the quality and quantity of training; an increase in the number of quality games, but a reduction in the overall amount of games. Between the myriad state, regional and national competitions, showcase tournaments and ODP events, a typical young American elite player was “stretched too thin.” Said U.S. U-15 boys national team coach Jim Barlow, “It was never more clear to me that things in our youth soccer structure needed to change than at our first U-15 camp last summer when about half of the players, on the very first day of national team camp, told their coaches that they were tired of soccer. Too many games, too many leagues, too many tournaments and camps, too much structured soccer had already taken its toll on this group of talented young players.” And thus came the launch of the U.S. Soccer Development Academy.

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