The Soccer Thread

[wolf stansson]

AZ hasn't shaken its wild inconsistency from last year, I see.

[shnsajax]

I'm not sure about the red card Ajax got. The winner for AZ was pretty. While lacking defense the Eredivisie is always fun to watch.

 

Christian Eriksen will be getting paid pretty soon. Not sure if Ajax sells him this window and if they can win it without him.

[Exile on Waveland]

Christian Eriksen will be getting paid pretty soon. Not sure if Ajax sells him this window and if they can win it without him.

 

And Toby Alderweireld may be sold too. Some rumors (probably unreliable) of a package deal to Spurs.

[Exile on Waveland]

Everything will be in English, it's easily accessible(NBC, ESPN, and NBC Sports will be where most of it is broadcast), and it's generally considered about the highest stakes and highest quality of play you can find at the club level.

 

It's also a very fast-paced league. Which is good for soccer fans, much less those new to the game. Watch EPL games and I'm pretty confident most sports fans would enjoy it and naturally start rooting for a team.

[jersey cubs fan]

Everything will be in English, it's easily accessible(NBC, ESPN, and NBC Sports will be where most of it is broadcast), and it's generally considered about the highest stakes and highest quality of play you can find at the club level.

 

It's also a very fast-paced league. Which is good for soccer fans, much less those new to the game. Watch EPL games and I'm pretty confident most sports fans would enjoy it and naturally start rooting for a team.

 

I'm about 4 years into watching the EPL with regularity, and while I enjoy it, I've yet to really pick up rooting for any one team. I've followed Dempsey's teams a bit, and at any given time I've found myself rooting for or against a team, depending on the situation, but still no real team I follow and care about.

 

Kind of awesome that it kicks off this week.

[Guest]

Roster for Bosnia

 

GOALKEEPERS (3): Cody Cropper (Southampton), Brad Guzan (Aston Villa), Tim Howard (Everton)

DEFENDERS (7): John Anthony Brooks (Hertha Berlin), Geoff Cameron (Stoke City), Edgar Castillo (Club Tijuana), Brad Evans (Seattle Sounders FC), Michael Orozco Fiscal (Puebla), Michael Parkhurst (Augsburg), Tim Ream (Bolton Wanderers)

MIDFIELDERS (8)): Alejandro Bedoya (Nantes), Michael Bradley (Roma), Joe Corona (Club Tijuana), Mix Diskerud (Rosenborg), Fabian Johnson (Hoffenheim), Jermaine Jones (Schalke), Sacha Kljestan (Anderlecht), Danny Williams (Reading)

FORWARDS (5): Jozy Altidore (Sunderland), Terrence Boyd (Rapid Vienna), Eddie Johnson (Seattle Sounders FC), Aron Johannsson (AZ Alkmaar), Bobby Wood (1860 Munich)

 

Only 2 MLSers in the 23. No Donovan.

[Exile on Waveland]

Everything will be in English, it's easily accessible(NBC, ESPN, and NBC Sports will be where most of it is broadcast), and it's generally considered about the highest stakes and highest quality of play you can find at the club level.

 

It's also a very fast-paced league. Which is good for soccer fans, much less those new to the game. Watch EPL games and I'm pretty confident most sports fans would enjoy it and naturally start rooting for a team.

 

I'm about 4 years into watching the EPL with regularity, and while I enjoy it, I've yet to really pick up rooting for any one team. I've followed Dempsey's teams a bit, and at any given time I've found myself rooting for or against a team, depending on the situation, but still no real team I follow and care about.

 

Kind of awesome that it kicks off this week.

 

Hmm . . . perhaps I was projecting my inclinations to others. If I start watching any sport with any regularity, I naturally pick up rooting for some team (even if for stupid reasons).

 

Yeah, excited. Though 7:45 a.m. for Liverpool is pretty gross for a Saturday morning. Still a good amount of uncertainty for this season overall, with three key players (Bale, Suarez, Rooney) all potentially changing teams.

[Guest]

Everything will be in English, it's easily accessible(NBC, ESPN, and NBC Sports will be where most of it is broadcast), and it's generally considered about the highest stakes and highest quality of play you can find at the club level.

 

It's also a very fast-paced league. Which is good for soccer fans, much less those new to the game. Watch EPL games and I'm pretty confident most sports fans would enjoy it and naturally start rooting for a team.

 

I'm about 4 years into watching the EPL with regularity, and while I enjoy it, I've yet to really pick up rooting for any one team. I've followed Dempsey's teams a bit, and at any given time I've found myself rooting for or against a team, depending on the situation, but still no real team I follow and care about.

 

Kind of awesome that it kicks off this week.

 

Hmm . . . perhaps I was projecting my inclinations to others. If I start watching any sport with any regularity, I naturally pick up rooting for some team (even if for stupid reasons).

 

Yeah, excited. Though 7:45 a.m. for Liverpool is pretty gross for a Saturday morning. Still a good amount of uncertainty for this season overall, with three key players (Bale, Suarez, Rooney) all potentially changing teams.

 

I'm generally like you when it comes to rooting interests but I too have found difficulty in picking up a single EPL club to root for. I basically end up picking and choosing teams with players from the USMNT.

[wolf stansson]

GOALKEEPERS: Cody Cropper (Southampton), Brad Guzan (Aston Villa), Tim Howard (Everton)

 

DEFENDERS: John Anthony Brooks (Hertha Berlin), Geoff Cameron (Stoke City), Edgar Castillo (Club Tijuana), Brad Evans (Seattle Sounders FC), Michael Orozco Fiscal (Puebla), Michael Parkhurst (Augsburg), Tim Ream (Bolton Wanderers)

 

MIDFIELDERS: Alejandro Bedoya (Nantes), Michael Bradley (Roma), Joe Corona (Club Tijuana), Mix Diskerud (Rosenborg), Fabian Johnson (Hoffenheim), Jermaine Jones (Schalke), Sacha Kljestan (Anderlecht), Danny Williams (Reading)

 

FORWARDS: Jozy Altidore (Sunderland), Terrence Boyd (Rapid Vienna), Eddie Johnson (Seattle Sounders FC), Aron Johannsson (AZ Alkmaar), Bobby Wood (1860 Munich)

 

 

 

Some head scratchers but they won't play so, oh well.

I'd go:

 

----------------------------------Howard

Evans---------------Brooks-------------Cameron------------Johnson

------------------------Jones-----------Bradley

Bedoya------------------------Mix-------------------------Johnson

--------------------------------Jozy

 

 

Don't believe Johannsson can play until his one-time switch goes through.

[shnsajax]

This might be the tightest overall season the EPL has had in a long time. At least from the standpoint we could see 3-4 teams battling for the title rather than 2. It won't have the finish we had two years ago when City won it, but that probably won't happen again I out lifetime. Lots more parity hopefully.

[jersey cubs fan]

Hmm . . . perhaps I was projecting my inclinations to others. If I start watching any sport with any regularity, I naturally pick up rooting for some team (even if for stupid reasons).

 

Yeah, excited. Though 7:45 a.m. for Liverpool is pretty gross for a Saturday morning. Still a good amount of uncertainty for this season overall, with three key players (Bale, Suarez, Rooney) all potentially changing teams.

 

There isn't really a list of sports I've taken up watching besides the ones I watched when I was a kid, so it's tough to compare. The only team I care about now that I didn't as a kid is the USMNT, but that doesn't count since I'd root for any US-based team if I followed the sport they played. To me, becoming a fan of something is what happens when you are a kid, and then it just sticks with you. I can't really force myself to be a fan of a team.

 

 

Those 7:45 games are the whole reason I got into the sport, since I was waking up with the baby already and needed something on in the background while she played.

[bukie]

Bosnia's a real quality team. This could get ugly.

[wolf stansson]

Bosnia's a real quality team. This could get ugly.

Meh. I doubt it. Our record in Europe under Jurgen has been relatively spectacular and this is a strong first 11. Depth is bad, but the starters can hang.

 

JK's first comments re: Dempsey:

http://www.ussoccer.com/news/mens-national-team/2013/08/klinsmann-discusses-roster-and-match-against-bosnia-herzegovina.aspx

ussoccer.com: What are your thoughts on Clint Dempsey’s move to MLS?

JK: “It’s been a huge week. Having Clint back in the United States and joining MLS is big and I think everyone in the U.S. is excited about the news. I am thrilled for MLS because you have an outstanding player now hopefully filling more stadiums and getting even more kids and people excited about the game. For Clint it’s a challenge, coming from one of the top leagues in the world, coming back to the U.S. and being back in MLS where we still have to work on a lot of things. Clint himself has set the highest benchmark for himself over the last year. He became our captain and he has to keep that benchmark and he knows that. I told him that over the last two years that he’s got to go for the next level. Obviously we want the best Clint Dempsey ever and that’s what we’re going to push him toward as we begin to look toward Brazil. He has set a high standard for himself, and it’s up to us coaches to make sure he keeps that high standard.”

 

ussoccer.com: You left Clint and several MLS-based players off the roster. What went into that decision?

JK: “For the most part we wanted to leave the MLS players behind because it’s a long way to go for a mid-week game in the heart of the season and many of them were with us a lot during the summer. This gives us a chance to look at some different players as well. At the same time, we still want a strong team so we have some guys from MLS and also from Liga MX. I told (Sounders head coach) Sigi Schmid that it’s no problem to leave Clint off this roster. It’s been a long week for Clint and he is still in preseason and getting a rhythm, so we leave him in Seattle and get him ready for the games in September.”

 

 

I'm really excited to hear from John Anthony Brooks. This is the first player to choose the US while still having serious interest/getting call up's from the Germans. Hopefully he gets a chance to speak to the media about how and why he made his choice.

[Exile on Waveland]

Those 7:45 games are the whole reason I got into the sport, since I was waking up with the baby already and needed something on in the background while she played.

 

Ah yeah, normally I would not be awake at that time on Saturday. I also don't have these channels and so can't just roll out of bed to watch, I have to make my way to the local soccer, ahem, "pub."

[wolf stansson]

Great Dempsey interview from Wahl: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/soccer/news/20130812/clint-dempsey-seattle-sounders-mls-interview/index.html

[USSoccer]

I think those JK comments are positive regarding Clint's move, but I'm not entirely sure, since the end of that first answer doesn't quite make sense to me on a certain level.

[wolf stansson]

Seems pretty much like he's not psyched about the move but he totally gets why Clint took it.

[Guest]

Great Dempsey interview from Wahl: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/soccer/news/20130812/clint-dempsey-seattle-sounders-mls-interview/index.html

 

I feel like I can still push myself here, and I want to get back a little bit to kind of like the old me. Because I grew up watching South American soccer. That's really what I enjoyed, being on the ball a little more, a little more creativity. It felt like when I went to Europe it kind of hindered that a little bit. It was more one- and two-touch and never lose the ball, that kind of thing. It helped me be more of a complete player and see the field better and make quicker decisions, but I feel like I have a good mix now, and I want to get back more to that creative style.

 

This was the most interesting bit of the interview, I thought.

[USSoccer]

That and the part where he says that Lawrie Sanchez forbade his fullbacks to play through the midfield. For an EPL team.

 

That's madness.

[wolf stansson]

Lawrie Sanchez also used Boca in that midfield an awful lot. He was essentially playing a 8-1-1

[wolf stansson]

Steve Goff drops an article about Gideon Zelalem's chances at playing for the US. Sound like there's still a remote possibility.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/soccer-insider/wp/2013/08/12/could-arsenals-teenage-phenom-play-for-u-s/

My whole thing is that while he's ethnically Ethiopian, was born in Germany and lived there until he was 9, just watch that video at the bottom of the article. When he speaks, it's with an American accent.

[Guest]

Choose your own adventure to find out your MLS team: http://www.the-twelfth-man.com/index.html

[shnsajax]

Steve Goff drops an article about Gideon Zelalem's chances at playing for the US. Sound like there's still a remote possibility.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/soccer-insider/wp/2013/08/12/could-arsenals-teenage-phenom-play-for-u-s/

My whole thing is that while he's ethnically Ethiopian, was born in Germany and lived there until he was 9, just watch that video at the bottom of the article. When he speaks, it's with an American accent.

 

Does Gulati have a specific person working with him that is tied to immigration. Seems like we have a need for this, now more than ever too with Zelalem.

[shnsajax]

Aron has been approved!

 

http://m.ussoccer.com/News/Mens-National-Team/2013/08/Forward-Aron-Johannssons-Change-of-Association-Approved-by-FIFA.aspx

[wolf stansson]

This is the definitive Michael Bradley profile: http://deadspin.com/americas-most-important-soccer-player-conquers-the-old-1113369327

Oh man, that's a good read.