First the good news: The All-Star Game was a delight to watch for many reasons, well stated by Bill Archer. The game may not be a technical tour de force, and perhaps some players could use a rest. But the game is free from gamesmanship and cynical defense, and it's a great platform for segments such as an interview with Andy Williams, who told ESPN2's audience that his wife is improving in her bout with leukemia.

Beautiful Rio Tinto Stadium in Sandy, Utah. A suburb of Salt Lake City was the host for this years All-Star Game which was a fantastic display of Goalkeeping we haven't seen in a while. Both Kasey Keller & Tim Howard making diving save, after diving save to keep their sides alive for the eventual match winner that never came and all credit to Everton's Manager David Moyes for taking this event seriously and having a little fun.

Major League Soccer Commissioner Don Garber held a special meeting in New York City with Houston Dynamo midfielder Stuart Holden on Thursday to discuss a new deal, according to Houston's FOX 26. The move is a strong sign that the league considers the up-and-coming U.S. international as one of their most important assets and wants to avoid losing him during the offseason.

This field of dreams is likely to remain just that.
If you are St Louis area soccer fan you better be prepared to either wait for a USL team or root for your current WPS team St Louis Athletica. In an interview with Brian Roth of the Kansas City Wizards finally says what has been whispered (and rumored here on MLSR for a long time) that St Louis's MLS bid is most likely dead.

Your inaugural WPS All-Star Team:
Karina LeBlanc GK - Los Angeles Sol, Canada
Tina Ellertson D - Saint Louis Athletica, United States
Amy LePeilbet D - Boston Breakers, United States
Alex Scott D - Boston Breakers, England
Camille Abily M - Los Angeles Sol, France
Sonia Bompastor M - Washington Freedom, France
Shannon Boxx M - Los Angeles Sol, United States
Lori Chalupny M - Saint Louis Athletica, United States
Kelly Smith M - Boston Breakers, England
Eniola Aluko F - Saint Louis Athletica, England
Marta F - Los Angeles Sol, Brazil
The first order of comedy, of course, is that half of this team won't be available for the All-Star game itself, or for the WPS championship, thanks to the UEFA Women's Championship.

Fan voting is under way for this years MLS All Star Game. Just like with other all star games sometimes the fans of one team can dominate the voting. Luckily for everyone that is not on the Seattle Sounders FC roster the fans vote only count 25% of the final tally to determine the starting 11.

FIRE KINNEAR NOW.
I told you this was going to be a blowout Everton victory, and I was right. American soccer has proven once again that it does not belong on the world stage. But that's not news - how long has it been since the United States national team hasn't beaten a highly-ranked opponent?

He's back in Seattle after the crazy migraine attack that blindsided him after/during the MLS all-star game Wednesday night.
Word is it's not as serious as the attack that sidelined the Swede for a couple games earlier in the season.
If ever there was a game to be suspended for a red card, it's the same game (Sunday at San Jose) that you're recovering from freaky massive headaches.

After Major League Soccer's regular season took a brief hiatus to participate in its All-Star Game spectical against English Premier League's Everton in which Everton won 2-1 in PKs after the game ended in a 1-1 draw, teams resumed their play over the weekend with some jaw-dropping results.

In one weekend, MLS fans across the country saw the second-worst team in MLS (San Jose Earthquakes) shutout a playoff-bound team (Seattle Sounders FC), 4-0; a six-goal game between FC Dallas and Kansas City Wizards in which all six goals went to Dallas, leading to the dismissal of Wizards Head Coach Curt Onalfo; and two teams improving their vying to improve their playoff position totalled seven goals in a 4-3 Houston Dynamo win over DC United.

Just a quick one today, because I have two ESPNSoccernet pieces to produce over the next few hours, including an All-Star game preview and 600 words of tight and true from Chelsea-Club America. But I do have something snarky to say: I took a some heat for not including Robbie Rogers in a list of [..

Some didn't like the All-Star jerseys but AT&T is a mega sponsor. (Getty Images)

You know it has been a couple days since this all went down in Sandy, Utah, but still never to late to talk about it since it is a big deal for Major League Soccer. No I am not talking about the loss in the All-Star Game to EPL side Everton.

We wrote last week that Everton will be playing the MLS in this year's all-star game in Salt Lake City.

In announcing the game MLS Commissioner Don Garber said "We are very excited about Everton FC agreeing to be the opponent for the 2009 MLS All-Star Game. Everton is an elite European club that features many world-class players".

I just got my profile set up at www.footbo.com - social networking for football fans by football fans. Something between my cable modem and my computer is going really slow this evening so I haven't been able to get around the site as much as I would like yet, but I look forward to exploring it soon.

Here are my votes in the media balloting for the 2009 Major League Soccer All-Star team:

GOALKEEPER (1)
Kasey Keller, Seattle Sounders: Although he doesn't have the best stats in the league, he's having the best year.

DEFENDERS (3)
Chad Marshall, Columbus Crew: Scores goals, shuts down opponents, plays clean.

The MLS All-Star First XI was announced on Monday, and as expected, Seattle led the way with selections, only not as many might have thought.

Kasey Keller and Freddie Ljungberg were named to the MLS All-Star First XI in their first seasons in the league. Voted on by fans, players and media, the MLS All-Star First XI is the group of players who received the most votes, but isn't necessarily the group that will start against Everton at the All-Star Game at Rio Tinto Stadium on July 29th.

Many MLS fans decry the All Star Game. They aren't used to it. Unlike the Playoffs, this is something without a parallel in world football. This is purely an Americanization. Frankly I like it. The voting is proper. No matter how much fans stuff the ballot the First XI are basically the top [...]

Hey party people. Josh, naturally, has the US Open Cup liveblog tonight. In about fifteen minutes, actually. Whoops.
I stupidly picked both road teams to win, so the least I can do is defend that point of view.
So, why did I pick against the defending champs at home. Why, why, why.

The Boys Team Camp is wrapping up today over at Missouri State University and as is my tradition, I took in the All-Star game this morning. With 14 teams and over 240 players, the game featured the top 10% of players in camp. My MVP, on the basis of a pair of quality goals scored, was senior Eric Grisham (#10, Maroon team) of the Washington Blue Jays.

Chicago Fire defender Bakary Soumare is replacing Brian Ching on the MLS All-Star Game roster. Ching is being excused from the All-Star Game to recover from the CONCACAF Gold Cup, where he has started for the U.S. men's national team.

Soumare is coming off an MLS Best XI season and will be making his first MLS All-Star Game appearance.

Montreal's UM02 Ultras may want to be locked into tomorrow's All Star Game press conference.
All roads seem to lead to an announcement that Montreal will be the 19th MLS club being made during the All Star game. Here's why:
Over the weekend the MLS Board of Governors met.

As part of our series called "10 v 11" interviews with MLS players, MLS Rumors was fortunate enough today to talk with MLS All Star and Houston Dynamo midfielder Stuart Holden regarding his brand new customized boots, thanks to Adidas,.
Here is what he had to say:
MLSR: Stuart as a player, how was it to work with Adidas knowing they have worked with players like Zidane and Messi?

Does anyone have it?
Okay, Steve Pastorino. Anyone else?
Used to be I would at least turn and look at the thing. It was cute, once. Just a bunch of our favorite players goofing off on a sunny afternoon.
Then...geez, I dunno, it got all dark and pretentious on us.

As amazing as that sounds, it appears to be true.
Courtesy of the Salt Lake Tribune (thanks to RSLFM for the tip):

Having watched two of the greatest goalkeepers the United States has ever produced square off in the final chapter of the annual Major League Soccer All-Star Game, the man whose team and stadium hosted the dramatic duel in front of a record crowd came to an unorthodox conclusion:

He loves the shootout.

Pretty entertaining game tonight from the Rose Bowl where the Galaxy played Barcelona in the first game of the new phase of Euro preseason in USA. Barcelona won 2-1 in front of a 93,200+ person crowd.

The biggest story out of this game has to be David Beckham winning some support from fans (albeit, not in their home stadium) through an impressive free kick goal and a good all around effort.

Today's Talking Point

Shootouts after regular season ties seemed to have been confined to MLS' bad-ideas-graveyard, but when an owner of a successful MLS expansion franchise wants to bring them back, you have to wonder what is going on his head.

Can you believe Week 29 is here? Seems like only yesterday that we were all up in the all-star game and waiting for the return of Circus Beckham. Where has the time gone...

Ah, the elusive 90 minute performance. Now I remember what a true victory feels like! It was easy to expect United to let up a late goal after clearly being the better team for the entire game, but instead they added another, thanks to our two veteran super subs.

All that glitters might not be gold here.

Major League Soccer has revealed the "First XI" for the All-Star game set to be played Wednesday, July 29 at Rio Tinto Stadium in Utah against Everton FC. As per MLS rules, these aren't your starters... just your First XI...

Photo by ISIphotos.com

While there were no real shocking selections in the 2009 MLS All-Star First XI, there were still plenty of question marks surrounding some of the picks, as well as how some of the voting broke down.

The Boys Team Camp is wrapping up today over at Missouri State University and as is my tradition, I took in the All-Star game this morning. With 14 teams and over 240 players, the game featured the top 10% of players in camp. My MVP, on the basis of a pair of quality goals scored, was senior Eric Grisham of the Washington Blue Jays.

... but it's a grey, rainy morning here in NH. Cool, too. So much for mowing the grass today!

At least the weather was decent for last night's Breakers' game. I didn't go, but it looks like the B's worked hard and pressured Sky Blue (especially in the first half) ... but couldn't put the ball in the net.

MLS has released their All-Star Game media schedule, and in the mix is a planned "special announcement" by Don Garber at 2:30 MT (4:30 ET) Monday. Word on the street is that Montreal is on the verge...

Regardless of whether or not Major League Soccer invites a foreign club to participate in the All-Star Game, two rosters of MLS players are selected as All-Stars. The following are the 18 inactive All-Stars: GOALKEEPERS: Pat Onstad (Houston Dynamo), Donovan Ricketts (LA Galaxy) DEFENDERS: Jonathan Bornstein (Chivas USA), Frankie Hejduk (Columbus Crew), Jimmy Conrad (Kansas City Wizards) MIDFIELDERS: Guillermo Barros Schelotto (Columbus Crew), Shalrie Joseph (New England Revolution), Dwayne De Rosario (Toronto FC), Ricardo Clark.

Wizards defender, Jimmy Conrad, will not be playing this Wednesday against Everton FC in Salt Lake in the MLS All Star game, but Conrad will be there. Conrad has been named an "inactive" All Star for the game. Basically, under the league's collective bargaining agreement, MLS still has to name 32 players as All Stars for bonus purposes.

Daily Talking Point

There's considerable debate about the value of the MLS All-Star game going around today. A sold-out Rio Tinto stadium in Salt Lake looked impressive last night, but the tepid match and the penalty kicks to determine the result seemed rather pointless does anyone actually care that Everton won?

2009 MLS All-Stars (Getty Images)

A lot of folks this morning are calling for the end of the MLS All-Star game, or at least the current format of it. While I am more in the ladder part of the calling I do not see this current game going away at any point in the near future after what we saw last night.

The All-Star game is done and dusted, the mid-season friendlies with European clubs are at an end and the business half of Major League Soccer's 14th season is underway. So what better time to have a look at the movers and shakers and find out where the big stories will lead in the second half of the campaign?

With J Hutcherson -- Allow me to revisit a previous point and invite everybody to wonder what I was thinking picking Chivas USA to be a prime mover over the month of August. Not a lot of games leading into August, ample recovery, and no thought of a fluke injury at the All-Star Game costing them their keeper.

Wizards president, Robb Heineman was on Between the Lines today in Kansas City and talked about the development going on right now at the Bannister Mall site. You can listen to the full interview here. Some good information in the interview, some that was already known, and some good new information as well.

MLS is set to announce the MLS All Star Game opponent tomorrow morning but MLSR has already learned that the opponent is in fact Everton of the Barclays Premier League.
What do you think? The Toffees....Good choice?