Category: What They’re Saying

“I was there dressed just lying on my bed for a couple minutes before going to another meeting and suddenly I felt the room moving left to right … mirrors were falling and I felt as though my room on the 31st floor was almost going down to road level and back up. I heard screams throughout this which lasted for about five minutes. I was dazed… I was stunned literally. Then it just subsided. I didn’t move… I just laid on the bed.”

— Concacaf president Jack Warner, who was staying at the Sheraton Hotel in Chengdu, China, for a soccer tour at the invitation of the Asian Football Confederation when a 7.8-magnitude earthquake hit. More than 12,000 people are reported to have died. (soccer365.com)

“I think some people might not be as devastated as I am. It might be because of personal situations with some guys leaving. But you have to play well to leave and I don’t know if a lot of guys did themselves any favors.”

— American goalie Marcus Hahnemann criticizing his Reading teammates for lack of effort after the Royals were relegated from the English Premier League after only two seasons in the top flight. (BBC Radio Berkshire)

“No one is to blame and it is certainly not that we are unprofessional but it is not something we will be doing again.”

— Lee Thorpe of English fourth division club Rochdale after breaking his arm in three places while arm-wrestling with a teammate on the bus taking them to Saturday’s playoff match at Darlington. (Reuters)

“I’m starting to see in the MLS there isn’t much consistency.”

— Los Angeles Galaxy midfielder David Beckham after his team dropped a 2-1 decision at home to the New York Red Bulls, conceding the deciding goal in the 78th minute, a minute after it had tied the game. (Daily Breeze)

“We want to get paid.”

— Slogan on T-shirts donned by Levante players before their Spanish La Liga game against Deportivo Coruna. Levante players, who are owed millions of dollars in back pay, staged a stand-still kickoff protest at the game’s start, remaining stationary as a Coruna player dribbled the length of the field and shot the ball out of bounds for a goal kick.

“It is a basic requirement that they have some command of English.”

— Britain’s immigration minister Liam Byrne, announcing that non-Europeans who want to play in the English Premier League will not be exempt from tougher immigration rules that will require passing an English-language test covering everyday phrases and simple conversation. (AFP)

“There was no sex or drugs that night.”

— Police inspector Carlos Augusto Nogueira on the Ronaldo run-in with transvestite prostitutes, who recanted their accusations against the Brazilian striker. Ronaldo has lost a $4.8 million endorsement contract with a cell phone company because of the incident, although prostitution is not illegal in Brazil. (AP)

“I was told in no uncertain terms by American football coaches and baseball coaches that I would amount to absolutely nothing if I stuck to playing soccer. You’re an idiot for doing it. Now I get to go back and say ‘Hey look, it worked out!'”

— American goalkeeper Brad Friedel, whose professional career of a decade and a half has been spent mostly in the English Premier League. (SkySports)

“In Central America, with the U.S. teams, we’d get stuff thrown at us, but not as bad as that. [Toronto fans have some] good aim. They were wrapping it around my ankles and I really had to stop. It was in the way, but it’s good. That’s great and they’ve really been a breath of fresh air in this league with the atmosphere they create.”

— New York Red Bull midfielder Claudio Reyna, who during Thursday’s 1-1 tie at Toronto FC had to untangle himself from crepe paper streamers to take a corner kick at BMO Field. (ESPNSoccerNet)

“The closed-circuit cameras do not film this part of the stadium because it’s not considered an area of conflict. We know it came from this area because you don’t find ice cubes of that size in other parts of the stadium.”

— Boca Juniors president Pedro Pompilio after a linesman for its Libertadores Cup game with Cruzeiro suffered a cut on his forehead from an ice cube thrown from the “private box” section of Boca’s Bombonera stadium. Pompilio is asking fans to identify the culprit. (Reuters)

“Shut up! You keep quiet and get on with the game. Die!”

— What Japanese referee Yuichi Nishimura said to Oita Trinita defender Taikai Uemoto during a J-League game, according to several players. The Japan Football Association is investigating. (Reuters)

“It is necessary to clarify that no formal accusations were made against Ronaldo. An advocate of social causes, Ronaldo has never used drugs and has always been admired by children in Brazil and around the world. There are indications of an extortion attempt in which the Milan striker is the only victim.”

— A statement on Ronaldo‘s Web site following in a run-in with cross-dressing prostitutes who are accused of attempting to extort money from the Brazilian star. The motel manager at the scene said Ronaldo tried to get rid of the prostitutes after realizing they were men. (AP)

“He needs to look in the mirror and see how big he is.”

— New York captain Claudio Reyna on teammate Jozy Altidore, who had bemoaned rough treatment by San Jose defenders before sparking the Red Bulls’ win on Sunday. (New York Times)

“Unfortunately, a lady was standing by and I accidentally brushed her with my foot. I apologized profusely and went back to make sure she was OK. I have arranged for a bouquet of flowers to be sent to her. Credit to her, she laughed it off and was very understanding. She said she wasn’t hurt.”

— Manchester United defender Rio Ferdinand, who accidentally kicked a stadium usher while kicking at a break wall after Chelsea’s winning goal, a Michael Ballack penalty kick, in Man U’s 2-1 loss. (Reuters)

“My suggestion is that the judge get a pair of scissors, cut the thing in half and give half to each. It’s certainly not anything that we would ever want to have happen and certainly not anything that David [Beckham] or any of our players who hand out jerseys would have intended.”

— Los Angeles Galaxy President Alexi Lalas upon learning that the parents of two boys have hired lawyers and threatened lawsuits in a battle over the jersey David Beckham gave one of the boys after the Galaxy’s game in Honolulu in February. The two boys, friends ages 9 and 10, brought a sign greeting Beckham to Aloha Stadium. Beckham gave his shirt to the 9-year-old, but parents of the 10-year-old say he deserves it because he held the sign the entire game. (Honolulu Advertiser)

“They hit me with a camera!”

— Diego Maradona during a melee while leaving a Buenos Aires courthouse following an arbitration hearing with his former agent, Guillermo Coppola. Maradona threw a wild punch and yelled insults at television reporters who crowded him. (AP)

“Luxemburgo distrusts a big club like Sao Paulo and it means he also distrusts me. But how am I going to spray gas at myself? It was a very serious incident. If I had been trying to pull a fast one, then I would have taken the team off the field at halftime and abandoned the game. I hope he regrets his comments.”

— Sao Paulo coach Muricy Ramalho responds to insinuations from Palmeiras coach Vanderlei Luxemburgo that Ramalho was responsible for the mysterious gas that forced Sao Paulo players to flee their locker room at halftime of their game at Palmeiras’ stadium. Luxemburgo was implying that it was a ploy by Sao Paulo to discredit Palmeiras’s stadium. The unidentified substance had caused irritation to their eyes and nostrils. (Reuters)

“It’s something we’ve discussed. It hasn’t gotten to the stage yet of talking contracts, but there definitely have been some conversations about the possibility of me coming back and being a part of the team.”

— Goalkeeper Kasey Keller, on the possibility of joining MLS expansion franchise Seattle Sounders FC for its first MLS season in 2009, when Keller, a Washington state product, will be 39 years old. Keller, currently with EPL club Fulham, has spent his entire pro career in Europe, with clubs in England, Spain and Germany. (Seattle P-I)

“Bolivia will bring an action for discrimination and marginalization before the United Nations. It is an aggression, a provocation and an intimidation from the FIFA president [Sepp Blatter] against our country and against South America. We cannot tolerate these type of sanctions.”

— Bolivia President Evo Morales announces that he’ll bring to the United Nations his challenge to FIFA’s ban on his country’s national team from hosting World Cup qualifiers in La Paz because of its high altitude . (AFP)

“I know all about Gazza and I feel I can help him. A lot of top sportsmen have suffered in their private lives, including me, and that is why I want to help. I still see him as a superstar and would like to meet him if he feels up for it.”

— Former heavywieght boxing champion Mike Tyson offers counseling and support to troubled Paul Gascoigne, who recently spent two weeks in a psychiatric hospital. Tyson’s own troubles included a rape conviction. (BBC)

“The fact is, I think, that soccer doesn’t fit the taste of the American sports fan, who likes a finite chance of success or failure on every play. It doesn’t have the type of pacing, like a lot of scoring. There is continuous play without scoring and the game is not susceptible to commercial breaks. Americans like fast burst of action and scoring. I would suggest tinkering with soccer, but I know that’s sacrosanct.”

— Superagent Leigh Steinberg, suggesting that soccer’s failure to make greater in-roads in the United States is due to its failure to achieve success as a television spectacle. (New York Times)

“If and when we pull it off, it is going to make me feel — well, at my age, that would be a great accomplishment. It would cap off a long time of development in San Jose.”

— San Jose Earthquakes co-owner Lew Wolff, 72, on the financial agreement his team of developers has reached with the city of San Jose on a $132 million deal that sets the stage for the construction of a soccer stadium and commercial project near San Jose’s airport. Wolff previously developed downtown San Jose’s Fairmont and Hilton hotels. (San Jose Mercury-News)

“The big problem is the increase in traffic — this is what they should be focusing on. Then they can really call themselves climate protectors.”

— Lydia Matzka-Saboi, spokeswoman for Global 2000/Friends of the Earth Austria, critical of the impact of Euro ’08 on the environment in Austria. Environmental groups complain that extra road traffic and increased air traffic during Euro ’08 will have a significant impact. Co-host Austria prides itself on its pro-green policies with more than 70 percent of its electricity produced using renewable sources and is seeking corporate sponsors to fund programs to compensate for the 40,000 tons of harmful carbon dioxide emitted by the three-week event in Austria. (Reuters)

“I don’t know if my heart can take all of them like this. Everybody should be made to watch this on TV and then say soccer is not exciting.”

— Columbus Crew coach Sigi Schmid after watching his team blow a 3-1 lead and then prevail, 4-3, over Chivas USA in a game that also featured eight yellow cards and two red cards. (Columbus Dispatch)

“I could commute from my cabin. We [his family] have always thought eventually when we’re done that we would go back, but you never know when that will be. We always talked about if a team did start up in Seattle then we’d want to go back at some stage.”

— Goalkeeper Marcus Hahnemann, 35, who has another season on his contract with English Premier League club Reading, hints at a return to MLS now that his hometown Seattle has a team, which begins play in 2009. (GetReading)