Tag: mls

[TV REVIEW] Less than a month into the regular seasons, MLS teams are far from the finished product, as coaches juggle players and alter tactics to find the right formula. Last year, a lot of juggling took place with the broadcast teams selected by ESPN2 for its MLS telecasts. Some games featured on-site hosts, some didn’t, several sideline reporters were used, and from the third week of the season the cable system used a three-man crew in the broadcast booth.

[MLS] The Los Angeles Galaxy, which has led the league in attendance in the previous five seasons and in eight of its first 12 seasons, is again the top crowd draw after one month of 2008 play. Leaguewide attendance (15,011) is slightly down from this point last season (15,487). 2007 leaguewide average attendance at season’s end was 16,770. Goalscoring in 2008 is up significantly from last season at this point: 2.93 per game compared to 2.27 in 2007. The scoring per game average at the end of the 2007 season was 2.66. For MLS attendance figures and team-by-team scoring …

[MLS] The first tangible result of a marketing partnership announced between MLS and the German Bundesliga last year has come to light.Borussia Moenchengladbach, which has won the league title five times and is leading the second division in its bid to earn promotion, will train for 10 days in the United States this summer and according to Associated Press is to play Colorado and FC Dallas during its visit.

To varying degrees of fanfare, more than two dozen foreign products — including two Designated Players — arrived in time for the start of the MLS season. Some have been in the lineup since the first weekend, a few others debuted last weekend or a week prior. Perhaps not until, say mid-June, will all of them have played at least a handful of games. Funnily enough, that’s when the USA/MLS secondary window opens, which could trigger at least one or two “major signings” and a few lesser ones. But with four weekends in the books, there’s enough data to highlight those imports who have adjusted most quickly to the demands of MLS and the roles given to them by their head coaches. Soccer America’s Ridge Mahoney ranks the MLS’s foreign newcomers. …

[NAMES & NUMBERS] The Los Angeles Galaxy rallied twice from one-goal deficits to tie defending champion Houston, 2-2. Landon Donovan scored both Galaxy goals, including a spectacular diving header set up by a David Beckham cross. For the weekend’s MLS developments …

Four weeks into the MLS season, FC Dallas remains the only undefeated team and defending champ Houston is still winless. For all the MLS summaries, standings, leading scorers and next week’s schedule …

The weekend’s slate has four games on Saturday and two on Sunday, when undefeated FC Dallas travels to Chivas USA. The only other undefeated team, Chicago, hosts Kansas City on Sunday.Two teams are looking for their first win: San Jose, which travels to Colorado, and defending champ Houston, which visits Los Angeles, where Beckham and Co., will try to rebound from last week’s embrassing home home loss to Toronto FC.

MLS, somewhat artificially, is promoting a few of its games along the lines of “Rivalry Week.” In the case of the Red Bulls playing the Revs, OK, why not, though both teams have fiercer histories against D.C. United and Chicago, respectively. The D.C.-Crew matchup Thursday night pitted former Argentine club rivals Guillermo Barros Schelotto (Boca Juniors) and Marcelo Gallardo (River Plate) in the “Yankee Superclasico,” a term that hopefully will be buried and forgotten by the next time they play, if not sooner.

[MLS] It seems nothing can shut down the young New England foreign players: not injuries, not jet lag, not paperwork snafus. A day after young Gambians Kenny Mansally and Sainey Nyassi, both 19, each scored a goal in a 3-1 triumph over Kansas City, the Revs reserves tied their Wizards counterparts, 2-2, as Costa Rican striker Argenis Fernandez, 21, scored both goals after joining up with the team late Wednesday afternoon.

Much that is good and bad about the MLS player-distribution system is personified in the return of Amado Guevara, who has left Honduran club Montagua, has been acquired by MLS, and was traded by his previous club, Chivas USA, to Toronto FC, for which he refused to play last year. Soccer America’s Ridge Mahoney explains the intricacies of the transaction.

[MLS] Marc de Grandpre, who, despite having no soccer experience, became Managing Director of the New York Red Bulls when the energy drink brought the franchise in 2006, has resigned. De Grandpre’s tenure was marked by the release of Coach Bruce Arena, who was at the helm for less than two seasons, and Giovanni Savarese, the popular and successful youth development director.

[MLS] New England became the first team to win on the road this season when it downed Kansas City, 3-1. The first Revs’ goal came on an own goal by Jack Jewsbury, who deflected a teammate’s header into the net. Jewsbury made amends by scoring from the penalty spot at the other end, but goals by Gambian teenagers Sainey Nyassi and Kenny Mansally provided the win for New England, which was missing injured attackers Taylor Twellman and Steve Ralston

[CONCACAF CHAMPIONS CUP] Houston didn’t have the horses. D.C. United didn’t have the archers. Both MLS teams, for the second straight year, fell in the semifinal round. In second legs played Wednesday night, Saparissa beat the shorthanded Dynamo, 3-0, in its home leg to win the series, 3-0, on aggregate; at RFK Stadium, United fell behind, 1-0, before rallying with two late goals to leave it a goal short of Pachuca on aggregate, 3-2.

[CONCACAF CHAMPIONS CUP/TV] The odds of an MLS team reaching the Concacaf Champions’ Cup final had seemingly increased when only one Mexican team, Pachuca, reached the semifinals and both Houston and D.C. United advanced. Yet both face an uphill battle in their respective semifinal series, the second legs of which take place Wednesday. Soccer America’s Ridge Mahoney explains MLS teams’ biggest handicap.

Can it be coincidence that the rumors of Thierry Henry perhaps heading to Seattle sooner rather than later surfaced at about the same time was announced the team nickname, which turns out to be a paragon of compromise? There’s nothing like a convenient distraction. After months of heated discussions among the ownership members and despite the adamant insistence of Commissioner Don Garber that the 2009 expansion team wouldn’t carry the same nickname as a loved but departed NASL franchise as well as the current USL entry, at high noon Monday came word: Seattle Sounders FC, joining the MLS club of Football Clubs that already includes Dallas and Toronto.

[MLS NAMES & NUMBERS] A six-goal Texas shootout, a winning start for the Red Bulls, and D.C. United’s emphatic rebound from its season-opening loss highlighted MLS Week 2 action.

With the season barely underway, only the Kansas City Wizards, which won their second straight game, and New York, which opened play last weekend, are MLS’s only perfect teams.

The New York Red Bulls play their first game of the season — and their first league match under Coach Juan Carlos Osorio — when they host Columbus on Saturday. FC Dallas aims for its first-ever win at Texas rival Houston. D.C. United , which lost its MLS opener last weekend and a Concacaf Champions Cup game in the midweek, hosts FC Toronto, which won only six games in its inaugural 2007 season and fell last week to Columbus. Chivas USA’s home opener is against Real Salt Lake, which like Chivas started the season with a tie. Kansas City and Colorado, which both opened with shutout wins, clash in K.C.