NASL teams have been busy recently, not only with the NASL Player Combine in sunny Florida this past weekend but in signing veteran players for the 2011 season. FC Tampa Bay announced the signing of veteran defender Frankie Sanfilippo, while the Puerto Rico Islanders also reached out for experienced backline leadership by adding former Aztex' captain Jay Needham.

Think media coverage of Major League Soccer in your area is poor? Try being a second division team. The Austin Aztex played in the FBM's backyard last season (before chasing the almighty dollar to Orlando) and local media coverage of the team was scant to say the least.
So kudos to North American Soccer League's NSC Minnesota Stars for taking it upon themselves to produce and promote a series that takes a behind-the-scenes look that the team and the players.

Welcome to the former home of The Aztexan, a former fan blog of the former Austin Aztex pro soccer team. Soccer supporters in central Texas had three good years backing our lads in red & white before they gave up on us and skedaddled off to Orlando late one October night. (If you're interested in the history of that departure, you can read the previous five posts below.

This was the round proper where the lower sides had to show their metal against the MLS sides as Round three proper came to the US Open Cup. Battle for Los Angels and battle for New York was very exciting to see while a former Texas club that moved to a Central Florida city came back to face FC Dallas and fireworks were early and late.

In the absence of the Aztex (or any other pro Austin team, so far), I've started another online soccer-related project: FC Shirts United:

The world is crawling with soccer teams. You know a few of them: the teams in your favorite league, the big teams from the world's big leagues.

Sporting Kansas City made one move today before the roster freeze at 4pm Central time today. Today KC announced that they'd acquired Kenyan defender, Lawrence Olum. Olum spent most of the year with Orlando City SC of the USL Pro division. The 27 year old Olum played in 21 games for Orlando City in league play, recording only 1 assist.

The Minnesota Stars held a press conference today announcing that with the help of the North American Soccer League (NASL) they will be back for the 2011 season and will play their games at the National Sports Center.

Aaron Davidson - Photos by Jermey Olsen - www.digitalgopher.

IMS sat down with Djorn Buchholz yesterday immediately following the Minnesota Stars press conference where it was formerly announced that the former Thunder GM and Aztex CEO will now take the reigns of the Minnesota Stars.

A confident Djorn Buchholz listens to questions from the media during Wednesdays Minnesota Stars press conference.

USL PRO, the organization that will run D3 soccer in the United States and Caribbean for the 2011 season, announced the playoff format for their fifteen-team league today from their Tampa, Florida headquarters. Eight of the league's fifteen teams will be eligible for the post-season playoffs.

In recent days the Montreal Impact completed their "French connection" by signing two players with Ligue 2 experience, midfielder Idriss Ech-Chergui and defender Kevin Hatchi. The signings bring Montreal to the seven foreign player roster limit.

American Wes Allen played for the Austin Aztex in 2009 and 2010 and is now joining his old teammates in Orlando.

The 24-year-old defender signed a one-year deal with Orlando City Soccer Club.

"It's great to be back with the fellas again," Allen said in a release. "I played with a lot of these guys in Austin.

Think media coverage of Major League Soccer in your area is poor? Try being a second division team. The Austin Aztex played in the FBM's backyard last season (before chasing the almighty dollar to Orlando) and local media coverage of the team was scant to say the least.
So kudos to North American Soccer League's NSC Minnesota Stars for taking it upon themselves to produce and promote a series that takes a behind-the-scenes look that the team and the players.

A happy day in the city the Free Beer Movement calls it's HQ, Austin, will welcome a soccer team once again. It's been nearly a year since the former club-that-shall-not-be-named skipped town in nearly the middle of the night and, well, as much as we try to push it into the dark recesses of our minds, it still haunts us.

The Austin Aztex will be back playing soccer next year just as they were when they started out in 2008, participating in the USL Premier Development League (PDL). David Markley, founder and minority owner of the previous Aztex franchise spoke to former Aztex supporters, Eberly's Army (formerly Chantico's Army) on Sunday giving them the news.

I remember first watching Jamie Watson play for Real Salt Lake back in 2005. Back then RSL was a dismal side with little direction. You could almost say it's fitting that Watson began his professional career there. For two years Jamie battled for playing time and failed to find his groove. It's perfectly understandable; Watson entered the league as a young man who was legally able to drink.

Freddy Field in Texas: Built on a labor of love & life celebration and with dollars earned exclusively through donation..

TSG gets a lot of impassioned pleas to help out through publicity or promotion for one cause or another.

They all resonate (The Freddy Fund, Little Feet, Soccer Without Borders, Street Soccer USA, all.

Erika Esola of the Seminole Chronicle recently interviewed Orlando City FC owner and former owner of the Austin Aztex, Phil Rawlins. As I've been saying for a while now Orlando City is closer to MLS than a lot of people have been giving them credit for. Whether you agreed with the way Rawlins handled the [.