Tag: mls

Kansas City’s 4-3 win over New England last Saturday was the highest scoring game of the 2007 season, but MLS goalscoring so far this year remains just barely over 2.5 goals per game. In fact, five teams have scored fewer than one goal per game. The lowest-scoring team in the league is none other than defending champ Houston, which has mustered just five goals in eight games. Just slightly worse in futility in front of the net are Columbus, Toronto, Real Salt Lake and Chicago. New England and Kansas City are tops, scoring at a rate of two goals per game. For up-to-date MLS standings, schedules, leading scorers, attendance and goalscoring averages …

Soccer America’s Ridge Mahoney provides the latest on efforts to bring back the Earthquakes and the Chicago Fire’s courtship with Chilean legend Marcelo Salas …

Eddie Johnson led the Wizards back from a 2-0 deficit with a hat trick to beat the Revs, 4-3. Toronto FC earned its first road goals and initial road point of the season by tying the Crew, 2-2. Reigning league MVP Christian Gomez awoke to lead D.C. United past Houston, 2-1, with a goal and an assist. Chivas USA strikers Maykel Galindo and Ante Razov each netted once to down FC Dallas, 2-0. Colorado took advantage of a Kyle Martino ejection to edge the Galaxy, 1-0. The Fire halted its four-game losing streak but did little else by lurching to a 0-0 home tie against Real Salt Lake. Soccer America’s Ridge Mahoney recaps all the Memorial Day weekend MLS action …

Fire fans who believed their team had already hit rock-bottom were proved wrong Thursday night. Chicago conceded two goals in the first three minutes to the New York Red Bulls (5-1-2) in a 3-0 defeat. After opening the season with a four-game unbeaten streak, Chicago (3-4-1) has dropped four straight.

[TV PREVIEW]. One game this weekend features a clash between to teams with winning records: New England vs. Kansas City. Columbus hopes to recover from a rout when it hosts Toronto, which now has high-scoring Jeff Cunningham. Slow-starting D.C. United and Houston, preseason favorites to MLS Cup, meet in D.C., each with losing records so far. Los Angeles, still in its pre-Beckham phase of the season, looks for its second win in Colorado. Chivas USA hosts FC Dallas. Winless Real Salt Lake meets a Chicago team that has lost four straight. Ridge Mahoney previews all of this weekend’s MLS action:

Not all great goalscorers, or great players, think alike. Real Salt Lake has sent striker Jeff Cunningham to Toronto in exchange for Alecko Eskandarian and TFC’s first-round 2008 SuperDraft pick. Despite scoring 94 goals in his MLS career, Cunningham has bounced among several clubs, and his quirky personality doesn’t mesh well with that of Coach Jason Kreis, who has not wavered from the no-nonsense approach that enabled him to set a league record – since tied by Jaime Moreno – of 108 goals. Let’s just say Kreis didn’t ask to wear No. 108 on his jersey this season before deciding to retire and take over as head coach.

Cunningham’s jersey number last year (76) and this season (90) refer to his goalscoring totals. (He’s netted four this year).

D.C. United, which was invited to take part in the Copa Sudamericana by virtue of its third-place finish in this year’s CONCACAF Champions Cup, will enter the Copa in the round of 16 and face Mexico’s Chivas Guadalajara. It was Chivas that eliminated D.C. United in this year’s Champions Cup semifinal (3-2 on aggregate). In 2005, D.C. United was the first MLS team to participate Copa Sudamericana. It lost in the round of 16, 4-3 on aggregate to Universidad Catolica of Chile.

Despite posting a 31-17-16 regular-season record in 2005 and 2006 while playing the most skillful soccer in MLS, United hasn’t returned to MLS Cup. United 2007 again features a glittering array of attackers – Christian Gomez, Jaime Moreno, Fred, Luciano Emilio – yet last Saturday it beat Toronto, 2-1, with the bedrock basics it had drifted away from: hard tackles, tenacious defending, fierce marking.

The New York Red Bulls drew another meager crowd (10,321) last weekend and has the second lowest attendance average. Bottom is Kansas City, which like New York is averaging fewer than 10,000 per game. New England’s Taylor Twellman didn’t connect in a 1-0 win over Houston, but remains atop the leading scorers’ list with six strikes. Trailing him are four players with four goals, Ken Cooper (FC Dallas), Maykel Galindo (Chivas USA), Clint Mathis (New York) and Chris Rolfe (Chicago). Mathis, who scored in the 4-0 tout of Columbus, has already scored twice as much as he did all last season for Colorado. In 2005, he scored three times for Real Salt Lake. For up-to-date MLS standings, schedules, leading scorers, attendance and goal-scoring averages …

[VIDEO] Defending champion Houston suffered through another shutout defeat as the Revs prevailed on a Shalrie Joseph goal. Juan Pablo Angel got his first MLS points in a Red Bull rout. FC Dallas extended its Western Conference lead by downing Real Salt Lake, for which Freddy Adu got his first goal. The clasico in Southern California featured a Landon Donovan goal. Jaime Moreno scored a milestone goal for D.C. United in Toronto. Colorado’s not doing it in its new home. Soccer America’s Ridge Mahoney recaps the weekend’s action

For the second time in six days, FC Dallas won, 2-1, on the road sin Carlos Ruiz in the starting lineup. On Saturday, FCD beat Kansas City. On Thursday, Coach Steve Morrow fielded the same starting lineup the beat the Wizards and FCD prevailed over Chicago in the Brimstone Cup to take over first place in the Western Conference. With Ruiz, a subject of trade rumors, sidelined with what was described as a tight left hamstring, Kenny Cooper and Colombian Juan Toja again provided the scoring

[TV PREVIEW] This is by far the most contentious weekend of league play to date. Six games in two days through which answers regarding many MLS teams will be provided. Among the clashes: D.C. United looking for only its second win of the season when it faces rising Toronto; a rematch of last year’s final; the season’s second Chivas USA-Los Angeles clasico. Soccer America’s Ridge Mahoney previews all the action.

[TV PREVIEW] Let’s hope the Brimstone Cup rivalry livens up the ESPN2 national telecast more than the Rocky Mountain Séance between Colorado and Real Salt Lake, a 1-1 tie with no cautions and just about as much passion, did last week. Chances are, it will. Both FC Dallas-Chicago meetings last year were 3-2 thrillers, with FC Dallas winning both of them. The Fire has been beaten in its last two, 3-1, on the road, and is back at Toyota Park, where it has won both of its home games. Last year, though, it lost at home to Dallas.