Time shows us that despite the dusty, oak panelled libraries of Arsenal history, the allusions of grandeur, the Marble Halls, the doorstop sized books with tales of trophy wins, Arsenal have always had an air of comedy about them. Slapstick lurks beneath the chapters of our voluminous encyclopedia.
It has been seven long years since Arsenal fans have been treated to a victory parade at the end of any season, but there is a real belief that this time around Arsene Wenger has assembled a strong experienced squad capable of upsetting the odds and finally picking up a trophy.
There have been a few false dawns over the years with some spectacular collapses by Wenger's men, and the Arsenal legend Michael Thomas (who scored that famous goal against Liverpool) thinks that this season won't be any different.
Former Gunner Terry Burton has rejoined the club as coach of the reserve team and head of
development. The 59-year-old rejoins Arsenal from Sheffield Wednesday, where he was the club's
assistant manager. Burton joined Arsenal as a schoolboy and won the 1971 FA Youth Cup with the club
and then coached the youth team back in 1979 and worked with Don Howe in the mid 1980s.
The Super Swede in action whilst living under the Ba'ath Party regime at Highbury
Arguably one of the most gifted (if inconsistent) players to play for the Gunners over the last
30 years or so, Super Swede Anders Limpar has launched a rather scathing attack on his former boss
at Arsenal, George Graham, comparing the Scottish manager's regime at the club to that of Saddam
Hussein.
Oh, is it that time of the year already? The football clubs of the Premier League are
making their preparations for the start of the new football season and this means, of course, the
release of their new kits. So, in the first of a two-parter what he thinks the kits of all Premier
League football clubs should look like will follow here's Ted Carter with his review
(and a league table!
1. It's difficult to conclude any differently than Manchester City boss Roberto Mancini: that was a
crazy finale to a crazy season. 2. Two decisive, trophy-winning goals during a longer than average
spell of injury time. Perhaps the tide really is turning in Manchester. 3. Manchester City fans
with a long enough memory will be [.
After winning the first 2 games of their 3 game road trip, Sporting KC had to be pretty confident
heading into their first game of the road trip in Houston against the Dynamo, even though the
Dynamo were unbeaten at their new stadium. The long trip, the tired/injured legs, and some
stupidity though all conspired against Sporting as they fell 2-1 to the Dynamo to close out the
road trip.
Sporting KC continue this hectic part of their season tomorrow night when they return to MLS action
against the Chicago Fire on NBC Sports. KC is playing their 5th game in 14 days when the Fire come
into Livestrong Sporting Park. The legs will continue to get heavy for KC as they're still playing
twice weekly for a few more weeks for KC.
I feel like we've been in this situation before. 270 minutes away from a championship for Sporting
KC and facing a team from a lower division, sound familiar? It should, last year, KC was 270
minutes away when they met up with the Richmond Kickers at the quarterfinals. KC controlled the
game, but couldn't find the net and after a weather delay, Sporting KC fell 2-0 ending their Open
Cup run short.
Sporting KC continue their busy stretch of games with a trip across the country. The day after
playing the Sounders in Seattle, KC traveled across the country to Philadelphia where they'll play
the Union at PPL Park in Chester. The brutal stretch of 4 games in 10 days is half over at this
time, but the cross country trip isn't fun.
In what turned into a physical affair from both sides, Seattle and Sporting KC found enough time
for each team to score a world class goal and then each settled for a point. With this game being
the second of 4 in 10 days, Peter Vermes made some surprising changes to his starting lineup.
Michael Harrington entered the game for Seth Sinovic, and he handed first MLS starts to Soony Saad
and Peterson Joseph, finally he handed an MLS debut to Michael Thomas.
The roster compliance deadline passed for Sporting KC without incident last week. KC is currently
sitting below the roster max of 30 players, and is set on internationals currently. As of this
moment, KC has 28 players currently on their roster. That only includes the players that are
currently under contract, even if they are not in camp currently, and will likely not play a role
in the team this year.
In a game that featured reserves, Sporting KC kept their undefeated start to preseason alive with a
1-1 draw with the Montreal Impact in the second game of the Disney Pro Soccer Classic. Only 3
players that saw the field in the opener against the Houston Dynamo were even dressed for the game
today against the expansion Impact.
Sporting KC is back in preseason action today as they kick off the Disney Pro Soccer Classic down
in Orlando, Florida. KC's opponent today is the Houston Dynamo, who defeated the Wizards in the
Eastern Conference final last year 2-0 to earn a trip to MLS Cup ahead of Sporting.
The Dynamo have Brian Ching back after spending time with the Montreal Impact, who selected him in
the expansion draft.
With the first preseason game of the season under their belts, KC is one step closer to the start
of the season. We are only 33 days from the first game of the season at DC United on March 10th.
With plenty of people seeming to be fairly in unison on who the majority of the starting 11 is,
let's take a look at the depth chart.
Player news is starting to pick up a little bit for Sporting KC. The team today made two
announcements on player news, and a new rumor has cropped up on another player.
First, after the announcement yesterday of the trade for Michael Thomas' rights, the team today
announced that they had signed the Olathe native to a contract.
Today was the second MLS draft, there was no ball room in Kansas City for the draft though. The
Supplemental Draft took place on a conference call and took about as long as half the first round
of the SuperDraft. After trading for Michael Thomas' rights, KC only had 4 picks, 1 in the first
and second, and 2 in the third.
The process that brought him in was a little unexpected, but the end result really wasn't. Today,
Sporting KC acquired the rights to former San Jose Earthquakes draft pick, Michael Thomas for a 4th
round Supplemental draft pick, the 73rd overall. The fact that Sporting had to give something to
San Jose for Thomas is the surprising part.
A few weeks ago, comments were made publicly about Michael Thomas coming to Kansas City. As
mentioned previously, the Notre Dame grad has played with multiple members of Sporting KC,
including Matt Besler and Seth Sinovic. Word out of Sweden is that Thomas will definitely not be
returning to club, Ljungskile SK.
It's been a quite few weeks when it comes to player rumors, really since Omar Bravo left for Cruz
Azul there have been few rumors regarding Sporting KC. As James said in his post regarding this
rumor, it's been campfire talk for a short little while, and it does seem to make sense. Michael
Thomas is currently playing with Ljungskile SK in Sweden.
The MLS July 1st guaranteed contract deadline is right around the corner, and teams are making
their moves to clear players off their roster. KC made their move today, waiving midfielder, Luke
Sassano. Sassano had been picked up by KC after the Re-Entry draft in a trade with the LA Galaxy
that sent the rights to Frankie Hejduk to LA.
The Swope Park Rangers have made it to the half way point of their 10 game reserve league season
tonight when they took on FC Dallas under the lights at the team's Swope Park training complex. The
roster saw only 2 players that had played minutes in league play so far this season, in Luke
Sassano who started, and Teal Bunbury who was a late sub.
In the first game of the season at Livestrong Sporting Park, the Swope Park Rangers defeated
Rockhurst University 2-0 on goals by Luke Sassano and Dom Dwyer. KC started the game with a lineup
that featured only two players that defeated DC on Saturday 1-0. Jacob Peterson and goal scorer, CJ
Sapong both started for the Rangers against Rockhurst.
With the slate of preseason games over for Sporting KC at this time, let's take a look at the
preseason stats for the players. First, Sporting KC went 4-1-2 during preseason. They won all 3
games that they played in Arizona, but only won one of four that they played in Orlando in the
second phase of preseason.
Sporting KC added another player to their roster today with the addition of Supplemental Draft pick
Kyle Miller. Miller, the 54th selection in the Supplemental Draft, is the 4th player from this
year's draft class to be signed, along with Dom Dwyer, Cyprian Hedrick, and Shawn Singh.
Since being drafted, Miller has consistently been training with the team.
A couple photos of Michael Thomas. Sporting KC acquired the right of first refusal to ThomasÂ
earlier today for a fourth round Supplemental Draft pick. Presumably he will be signed soon. Last
year Thomas trained with Sporting KC and even made an appearance in a reserve match as the often
seen but rarely named "Trialist 1".
Hours before the start of today's Major League Soccer supplemental draft, Sporting Kansas City
announced that they've traded their Fourth Round pick (73rd overall) to San Jose for the rights to
midfielder Michael Thomas. San Jose originally drafted Thomas in 2010, but he opted to sign with
Sweden's Halmstads.
I spend more time than I should trying to understand MLS' rules when it comes to player acquisitions. I do this because the rules as a whole aren't exactly that straight forward, with the draft, "college protection", discovery claims, allocations, and the like, it can be hard for the casual fan to understand exactly what is going on.
Soony Saad and Peterson Joseph made their first league starts for Kansas City.
Saad's start also made him the 3rd youngest player to ever start a league game at 19 years 308
days. He knocked Peter Byaruhanga at 20 years 364 days off the list.
Michael Thomas made his first appearance and first start for KC in all competitions.
By this point trips to Wembley had become the standard for Liverpool, and they headed south for
another final just three years after they defeated Everton. This time they would face Sunderland,
who were the first second division side in ten years to feature in an FA Cup Final. Liverpool were
the more talented and successful side, but the Northeast club had done their share of impressing
along the way to Wembley.
