Soccer America Archives

“Relationships suffer, parents, your family, birthdays, weddings, vacations … that’s what makes what I do so special, because I sacrifice a lot to do it, and I wouldn’t change it for the world. Eight more years. That’s my goal, to get to 2016 — if my body allows me to.” Abby Wambach sets out her […]

“In those moments of tension, when your pulse is going 180 a minute, we were happy because we had scored a goal and we only intended to celebrate it with the fans, because in this section we also had friends and family.” Barcelona defender Carles Puyol defends his team’s rejoicing after a late penalty-kick winner […]

“I gave you access in South Africa and I shouldn’t have given you access. It won’t happen again. From now on, no matter how many miles you travel to get an interview, you won’t get one.” Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson claims he’s never speaking to the press again, ever. So there.

Multi-chinned Newcastle United owner Mike Ashley has reportedly reduced the asking price for his club from $810 million to between $504-540 million. In case you’re interested.

If you’re going to fix a game, then you should try and aim for one that no one cares about. At least that might have been the philosophy behind a reported attempt to fix a UEFA Cup game last month between Marsaxlokk of Malta and visiting Croatian team Slaven Belupo. The Malta Football Association has […]

Not that Sven Goran Eriksson was desperate for fresh talent or anything, but a forthcoming book from former English Football Association Executive Director David Davies claims that the ex-England coach wanted to naturalize four EPL foreign players so that they could play for the national team. In ‘FA Confidential,’ Davies writes that after Euro 2004, […]

Both of Major League Soccer’s L.A. teams have had their struggles this season. But with just a handful of games left in the fight for a Western Conference playoff spot, there is a markedly different mentality between the L.A. Galaxy and Chivas USA. At Chivas, coach Preki said after the weekend’s hard-fought 2-1 in over […]

When it comes to putting money into soccer, business is business, while environmental causes and workers' rights are the domains of naïve idealists. This must be the case given the reaction of Utah's local media to the announcement Monday that mining company Rio Tinto has bought the naming rights to Real Salt Lake's new stadium […]

The story that broke Monday in the Sports Business Journal about the Las Vegas Sports and Entertainment Group buying an undisclosed stake in the Columbus Crew was an exaggeration, according to both the team and Paul Caligiuri, the former U.S. national team player who is spokesman for the investor group. Shawn Mitchell reports both sides […]

“It’s been a great season, especially compared to last, which was such a learning experience for me.” U.S. national team player Charlie Davies of Swedish club Hammarby talks to Ravi Ubha about coming to terms with being a professional.

“I would say the electric level in our heads was not high enough.” Arsenal coach Arsene Wenger offers a novel theory to explain why his team lost at home to Hull City at the weekend.

As part of an increasingly predictable trend, Everton is to appeal the straight red card shown to Tim Cahill for a late and clumsy tackle against Liverpool on Saturday.

“I think we tried to be a bit too gung-ho. We’ve got to try and have more of an English mentality. You wouldn’t have seven-eight-nine guys pushing up in the box trying to score a goal. You’d have six-seven-eight men back defending. Maybe we got to start doing that a bit more.” Two-goal Darren Huckerby […]

“The issue is whether his flaws are really fixable.” Jen Chang addresses the problem of Eddie Johnson, the U.S. national team striker currently struggling at Cardiff City in the English league’s second tier.

Another unhappy MLS coach was New York’s Juan Carlos Osorio, who was incredulous that his team could concede five goals at home, including four in the first half alone. Not that he’s going to go on about it. “I have been beaten before,” Osorio admitted. “But never in my life allowed four goals in the […]

Some would argue that with the prevalence of reality TV and the past decade’s obsession with celebrity culture, the dumb revolution has already happened. But then they didn’t watch New England lose 1-0 at Columbus Saturday, foolishly trying to play what its coach Steve Nicol condemned as “pretty passes.” “In the first half, if not […]

It seems like only last week that Toronto FC coach John Carver was saying that if his team failed to make the playoffs, he would entirely understand if he was given the sack. After failing to beat the Houston Dynamo at home on Saturday — a result that effectively, if not mathematically, ended TFC’s season […]

Houston Dynamo’s Canadian midfielder Dwayne De Rosario was back home at weekend as his side traveled to play Toronto FC. He took the opportunity to let the Canadian Soccer Association know about player discontent on the national team. “There’s just so much to be said,” said De Rosario. “The players really have no say. And […]

It’s not just the injuries and the tight schedule that are killing D.C. United. It’s also the lackluster play, the poor discipline, the missing confidence and the inability to score. As Steven Goff observes following Sunday’s 3-0 defeat at FC Dallas, the regular season, like the team’s Concacaf Champions Cup campaign, looks like it has […]