Laurie over at Sounders Offside is justifiably very upset over the allegations of rape currently surrounding MLS newcomer Fredy Montero. So I've decided to give her a small feel good present in the form of...Freddie Ljungberg modelling Calvin Klein tighty whities. All joking aside, the story that broke early Friday is a huge blow to Seattle, and MLS as a whole.

Posting has been a little slow over the past week, so here's one you might like.
This isn't directed towards other Toronto FC supporters. This is for the other MLS supporters - the one's who magically started throwing streamers in 2007, but "didn't get it from us." If you support another MLS club, here's 10 reasons why Toronto FC might be better.

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With the roster now selected, it is time to consider the options U.S. head coach Bob Bradley has when selecting his starting lineup in next weekend's World Cup qualifier vs.

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The lead pack in Major League Soccer is taking shape and this week's results set up a pair of big-time match-ups for next week.

Chivas USA remains the top team in the MLS Power Rankings despite its tie vs.

September is almost here and the MLS playoff race is beginning to tighten as teams begin to realize just how much tougher it is to make the post-season than it was a few years ago.

The Home Depot Clasico serves as the weekend's headliner, with the Los Angeles looking to put a stranglehold on the playoff spot it currently holds, while also putting a dent into its arch-rival's own post-season chances.

Could Bobby Convey be headed home to Philly? (Getty Images)

The speculation has begun for the Philadelphia Union and their expansion draft that takes place tomorrow afternoon. The 15 clubs released their protected list last night and now the Union have a full list of guys that they can get 10 players from.

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Over 30,000 tickets have been sold for USA v Honduras World Cup qualifier on Sat Jun 6 at Soldier Field in Chicago. (I will be there, will you?)
You make the call: How many are for USA? How many are for Honduras?
dN
Jeffrey Marcus of the New York Times addresses the real issue with MLS.

Seattle beat Colorado 1-0 in the last MLS play-in match of the US Open Cup on Tuesday. The win earns Seattle a berth in the US Open Cup. The eight MLS clubs will begin play in the 3rd round, on June 30.

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Two of the league's lowest ranked teams, Columbus and San Jose meet tonight in Columbus.

The King's Club. The White Ballet. The Galacticos (but not the Landycakes version). Rumour has it that one of the world's most storied clubs is coming to town on August 7th. They are so special that MLSE has agreed to lay down real grass over the turf for the game in order to protect the precious knees of their numerous stars.

The Honduran team has assembled in what has become their preferred training camp venue for national team preparations - Sunrise, Fla. Head coach Reinaldo Rueda has enlisted 23 players to get ready for the June 6 match in Chicago, including Toronto FC midfielder Amado Guevara. The Hondurans are in third place in the group on four points, which includes a 3-1 win against Mexico.

Goals from Dwayne De Rosario and O'Brian White gave us a 2-0 win over DC United yesterday at BMO Field. Here was our starting eleven: Stefan Frei, Nana Attakora, Emmanuel Gomez, Adrian Serioux, Jim Brennan, Amadou Sanyang, Carl Robinson, Sam Cronin, Pablo Vitti, O'Brian White, and Dwayne De Rosario.

I believe our team is heading down to Florida this weekend to continue their pre-season training. Hopefully we'll get some news on new trialists and potential signings soon.
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Amado Guevara has rejoined us from international duty with Honduras. Yesterday was his first day back in pre-season training.

Not a great deal of change this week. Parity continues to be the spice of life, as Chivas USA shows it isn't going to run away with the league completely. Power rankings are a lot harder to come up with when there are so many draws. Why can't coaches start throwing caution to the wind and really going for wins?

No Suazo = No Hope for Honduras?

For all the spinning going on in US Soccer circles the last few days' minimal attention has been paid to the opponent tonight, Honduras, and their own woes. While Honduras still has Amado Guevara and Carlo Costly at full speed, Wilson Palacios will be playing the first match since the tragic death of his brother, while David Suazo, perhaps the most skilled player in CONCACAF, and Julio De Leon an outstanding midfielder from Parma in Serie A will miss the match due to injury and suspension respectively.

The New York Red Bulls come to town tonight. They have lost their last four, and winless on the road this season, and have yet to score a goal away from Giants Stadium. Surely we can't mess this up, right?
I'd expect that newly-acquired defender Nick Garcia will slide right into the starting eleven, especially with Marvell Wynne away on international duty and Jim Brennan being a game-time decision because of an ankle injury.

The New York Red Bulls and Toronto FC are both in the midst of terrible skids and each will be hoping for the victory that can turn things around when they meet tonight at BMO Field (8pm, MSG+).

If the Red Bulls season is on life-support, then a loss tonight would essentially pull the plug on any faint playoff hopes the team might have.

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The media ballot for the 2009 MLS All-Star Game has finally made its way to my inbox, which means its time to seriously consider which eleven players will be getting votes.

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If Grenada was the appetizer then the U.S. Men's national team's next Gold Cup opponent has to be considered the main course, but while Honduras should provide a tougher test than the 'Spice Boys', this isn't the same Honduras team that pushed the U.

(With today's Gold Cup match between Honduras and the U.S. national team marking their first meeting here in Washington D.C. in eight years, I couldn't help but think back to that meeting two World Cup cycles ago, a match and a day among the most memorable of my career.)

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Fans clad in blue banged on the closed gates of RFK Stadium, demanding to be let into watch a very important World Cup qualifier, only these fans weren't Americans.

Columbus Crew forward Alejandro Moreno, Seattle Sounders forward Sebastian LeToux and Chivas USA defender Shavar Thomas were among two of the ten players chosen by the Philadelphia Union in Wednesday's MLS Expansion Draft.

Here is the list:

Brad Knighton, David Myrie, Shavar Thomas, Jordan Harvey, Shea Salinas, Stefani Miglioranzi, Andrew Jacobson, Nick Zimmerman, Alejandro Moreno, Sebastien LeToux

Surprising omissions?

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What a difference three days can make.

Last Thursday morning, after the U.S. national team's 3-1 loss to Costa Rica, pessimism was king and there was little reason for optimism regarding the U.

It has been a long time since I did an episode of the "Know Your US MNT Opponent" series, so I thought to myelf, "why not bring it back for the big match with Honduras tomorrow?" HON deserves the recognition because they are a strong side especially considering the fact that the nation's total population doesn't exceed that of New York City.

Thank you, NBCU.
Props to NBC Universal for answering the call of soccer fans around the country looking for the Aug. 12 World Cup Qualifier between the United States and Mexico to be available widely in English. They have now agreed to make Mun2, Telemundo's bilingual channel, available for free to all cable providers Aug.

Columbus. Saturday. 4:00. Be there. (...or watch on Gol TV @ 7:00)br /br /div style="text-align: justify;"Let's start to talk about our game this weekend. It is one of those dreaded international dates that MLS has ignored, yet again. We're not without nine guys this time, just two. Unfortunately, the two in question are Carl Robinson and Amado Guevara.

div style="text-align: justify;"Northern Invasion 2.0 is set to happen on Saturday at Columbus Crew Stadium. Last year we had around 2,500 road trippers. I'm hearing we'll have between 1,500 and 2,000 this time around, which is still pretty good, and something to be proud of. I'm previewing the match tonight because I'll be in Columbus tomorrow night checking out the town (which I hear is less than exciting.

Time for the second half of this American concept they call the home-and-home. Last week's tie with FC Dallas was a disappointment for TFC, though we are not under as much pressure as our opponents going into Sunday's match in the oven (or Pizza Hut Park), as they are still winless on the season.

Sweet. That was the team we expected to see game in and game out this season. We fully deserved those three points, and beating a team that came into the match undefeated really boosts my confidence towards the side. It's the first time we've ever beaten the Goats - and in my view, they just didn't look up to the task.

In two games across two competitions on Wednesday, Chivas USA had their undefeated streak broken and FC Dallas exits the US Open Cup. Toronto FC 1 - Chivas USA 0 First place in the Western Conference didn't hold up in Toronto on Wednesday, with Amado Guevara's goal in the 36th minute the only one of the game.

Kudos to the MLS expansion class of 2007, which takes up first place in both conferences heading into this week seven of action.

Toronto FC has posted two straight shutout victories to move into first place in the East and now has a chance to bury defending MLS champions Columbus even further in the East basement when the team's meet today.

The 2009 MLS season is a quarter of the way through and while we're still a LONG way away from hounding out season awards, we can still take a look at the players who have enjoyed the best form early in the season.

Picking the MLS Best XI is always a tough process but that doesn' mean we can't try to put one together for the first quarter of the season.

Everything you need to know from the weekend in soccer, including tons of season finales overseas, business as usual in U.S. pro leagues and a big qualification weekend in the U.S. Open Cup.
MLS
Toronto 3-1 New England: The Revs keep the makeshift forward tandem of Shalrie Joseph and Steve Ralston.

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The lead pack in Major League Soccer is taking shape and this week's results set up a pair of big-time match-ups for next week.

Chivas USA remains the top team in the MLS Power Rankings despite its tie vs.

As you probably know if you've been reading this blog over the past few months, my school went on strike during the winter, which has caused my exam stress to be in late May instead of mid April. While my thoughts have been on Toronto FC as much as ever, I have been spending much more time labouring over economics than writing about the beautiful game.

Colorado Rapids striker Conor Casey is leading Major League Soccer's race for the Golden Boot, but Real Salt Lake midfielder Kyle Beckerman is making a run at the league's Golden Ankle award.

He is tied for the league lead with five yellow cards in 11 matches.

So as the Rapids prepare to travel to Utah to face RSL on Saturday, The Tuesday List looks at yellow cards and fouls.

Some things to keep in mind for tonight's contest (live on ESPN and Galavision at 7 p.m. CT)
• Six players on the U.S. roster are carrying yellow cards into Chicago: Jozy Altidore, Carlos Bocanegra, Clint Dempsey, Frankie Hejduk, Sacha Kljestan, and Oguchi Onyewu. Should they receive another caution, it will result in a one match suspension.

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Toronto FC want Julian DeGuzman badly and is prepared to break the bank (of Montreal) to make it happen.

SBI correspondent and Canadian soccer expert Duane Rollins reported on his website, The 24th Minute, that TFC has made a seven-figure offer for the soon-to-be-former Deportivo La Coruna star.

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This past Monday marked the deadline for media ballots for the MLS All-Star Team, meaning I could no longer keep putting off my selections as I tried to choose in some of the toughest all-star selection races in recent memory.

So that was Toronto's soccer team playing in Toronto's soccer stadium last night.
I have just returned from a great holiday and I am finding it hard to fall back into old routines. Perhaps this is a part of a great holiday, you return home and find yourself in a strange state. You start to see many of the old familiar things in a new light.

Round 6 of CONCACAF 2010 World Cup Qualifying is fast approaching with three intriguing fixtures, including the highly-anticipated United States v. Mexico.

Honduras v. Costa Rica

Squad News: Costa Rica will be returning a majority of the Gold Cup squad that lost to Mexico on penalties in the semi-finals, including midfielder Celso Borges and captain Walter Centeno.

He's baaaaack! Apparently. The buzz around Toronto's television media is that Julian De Guzman is once again in the Toronto FC picture. According to some sources a contract has been agreed to but the sticking point is how TFC makes room in the algebra-like MLS salary cap. Scarborough's own would demand DP money and The Reds would have some hard choices to make.