After England's disastrous World Cup, manager Fabio Capello had an explanation for the squad's performance:

"Germany are always in good condition at World Cups because the Bundesliga is suspended for a month. In Italy, Spain and other countries they have two weeks, but in England it is impossible because we have four competitions.

Let me be clear: The person responsible for Bob Bradley getting a four-year contract extension is the president of the United States Soccer Federation, Sunil Gulati. In the end, it was his decision and he deserves the majority of praise or scorn depending on the results.

That being said, the small, yet influential United States soccer press corp are, at least, somewhat responsible for Bradley getting a second chance.

After outscoring its opposition 14-0 in the first three matches of the season, its seems on the surface Chelsea is primed to stroll to its second consecutive Premiership title. But one, big problem has generally been ignored by the soccer media: Chelsea doesn't have enough players.

Actually, saying, "Chelsea doesn't have enough players," is like saying "Wigan's defense is poor," or "Fulham struggles on the road.

I don't want to brag or nothing (awwww, who am I kidding, I really want to brag about this), but since the Gold Cup last year I wrote time, and time and time again about how good Stuart Holden is.

In January, I wrote he was significantly better than Ricardo Clark; In March, I said if there was a draft and I had to choose between Clint Dempsey and Holden — I would pick Holden; In June, I argued he should start against England in the World Cup.

Very quietly, Owen Coyle has proven himself to be one of the savviest English Premier League managers in the transfer market. He understands basic economic principles too many managers at the highest level simply don't get.

The key to the transfer market, like any market, is to master risk versus reward.

Let's say you think Bob Bradley has done a great job as United States national team head coach. You point to the U.S. winning the 2007 Gold Cup, finishing second in the 2009 Confederations Cup and a very respectable round of 16 appearance in the 2010 World Cup.

You're willing forgive some lineup head-scratchers (Robbie Findley, Ricardo Clark) because he instilled a "never give up" mentality and made clever tactical changes when he realized he made a mistake.

About a month ago, when the first "Manchester City wants to sell Ireland" stories began popping up, I assumed it was British "journalists" trying to fill space in their newspaper. Ireland was one of the best players in the Premiership two years, if nothing else he could be one of the best impact subs in the league.

With the English Premier League less than two weeks away, it's time for IntelligentSoccer.com to get over its World Cup hangover. There's a lot of preseason story lines (Are Manchester City title contenders? Is Cesc leaving or staying? Is Chelsea too old to repeat?) but what's getting a lot of attention is the new 25-man roster rule for the English Premier League.

It's over. No more early morning games, no more enticing over/under bets, no more national anthems, no more complaining about vuvuzela's or the Jabulani, no more questionable calls, no more goal celebrations, no more Martin Tyler, no more Paul the Octopus, no more Diego Forlan free kicks, no more Germany counter-attacks, no more Dutch karate kicks, no more Spanish 1-0 victories and no more World Cup.

With it's 1-0 victory over the Netherlands in the 2010 World Cup final, this Barcelona team, errrr, I mean this Spain team, should be considered one of the best national teams ever and has a chance to be considered the greatest.

Not only is Spain currently the reigning European and World Cup champs, but La Roja has lost only two matches in the last two years and during that run they had the longest undefeated streak (35 matches) and longest winning streak (15 matches) ever.

All Dutch and Spanish fans owe one big thank you (or, dank je wel; or, gracias) to a specific club team in their respected countries.

Ten of the Netherlands 23 World Cup players — five of whom will probably start against Spain — were part of Ajax's famed youth system. Barcelona's academy (La Masia) has contributed nine players to their country's national team and as many as seven could start in the final.

It a pretty safe bet at least one of the last three matches of the World Cup (the stupid third-place match doesn't exist to me) will end with two teams picking five players and taking undefended shots 12 yards from goal.

It's like finishing a basketball game with a free throw shooting contest.

The quarterfinals gave us a little of everything:

A shocking collapse, Felipe Melo doing his best 1998 David Beckham impression, the smartest hand ball in Cup history followed by one the biggest chokes in Cup history, a penalty kick shootout, a surprising blowout, rosary beads, Iker Casillas reminding the World he's scary good at blocking penalty kicks, Vicente del Bosque showing emotion, another penalty kick (good this time), a penalty kick called back (strangely), another penalty kick (blocked this time), David Villa allowing an entire nation to stop holding their breath and lots and lots and lots of crying.

I've been AWOL in the last couple days, and to my eight dedicated readers, sorry.

So I've had a couple days to look back at the United States 2010 World Cup and it's hard to ignore how close it was to complete disaster. If Michael Bradley volley went flying over the bar against Slovenia or if Algeria could have defended for one more minute, U.

Day 12

About four months ago, with the final seconds ticking away, the United States needed a goal or its tournament would be over.

All across the country, people hoped for a late goal but it was hard to ignore the reality of the situation: The U.S. was about to lose and were going to have to wait four years for redemption.