Manchester United are not the only Premier League team with the DaSilva twins on their books after Chelsea signed a trio of brothers from Luton Town. The Blues have now got their own DaSilva after they snapped up 12-year-old twins Rio and Cole Dasilva, as well as their 13-year-old brother Jay. Each sibling cost a [.

For the first time in franchise history, the Houston Texans have made it to the NFL Playoffs. On Saturday January 7, 2012, the Texans hosted their first ever Playoff game at Reliant Stadium, and prior to that game there was an indication that the Texans' front office had paid attention to the tifo displays that have occurred down the road at Robertson Stadium, former home of the Houston Dynamo, because, as evidenced by the above picture, they managed to orchestrate a tifo display worthy of any major football club in Europe.

If Sporting Kansas City's season had a title, it would be "Night and Day". A tough start to the season, no doubt spurred on by the never-ending road trip, saw the team open Livestrong Park and use its great atmosphere ...
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Poor New York Red Bulls. In a season when it was all supposed to come together (young stars! established DPs! weak conference! newish stadium!) it all fell apart. New York struggled all season and barely made the playoffs, defeating a ...
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With it being New Year's Eve, I figured it was time to take a look back at the 2011 wishes that I'd posted at the end of last year.
1. Return to the Playoffs - This was filled 100%, not only did KC qualify for the playoffs again, but the team won the regular season Eastern Conference crown and had home field advantage.

The Columbus Crew were certainly a surprise team last season. After cutting ties with a number of veterans and going with a roster that looked lacking on almost every part of the pitch, head coach Robert Warzycha coaxed a great ...
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Chicago ended the year as potentially the best non-playoff team in MLS. They caught "fire" and had a winning record for the final third of the season, almost stealing the tenth playoff spot from New York. The same team that ...
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This time last year, the San Jose Earthquakes were riding high. They had upset the New York Red Bulls in the Eastern Conference playoffs and had seen the emergence of Chris Wondolowski as a bona fide goal scorer. Although the ...
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Chivas USA had a new head coach and a new system last season, but after a slow start the team looked to be set in neutral in the competitive Western Conference. However, the acquisition of Juan Pablo Angel and a ...
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In my 2011 season preview, I predicted that Toronto would struggle for the first few months under its newest leadership structure (new general manager and head coach) but toward the end of the year start to look like a promising ...
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Victory, at last Just 10 years ago American Samoa were a footballing joke after being mauled 31-0 by Australia in a World Cup qualifier, a result that still stands as the most one-sided full international in history. And frankly their entire international record hasn't been much of a party either with the Pacific side managing [.

As our long-time readers know, MLS Talk likes to provide serious, well-thought out news analysis mixed with offbeat and laughable soccer-related thoughts. This is the latter type of post. Prior to First Kick 2011, the MLS Talk writers got together ...
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MLS has come out today with the schedule and playoff format for the 2012 season, and already the Twitterverse has blown up about it. As expected, gone is the balanced schedule of playing each team home and away. Back is the conference heavy schedule designed to cut down on travel for most teams (save Houston who is still separated from Dallas and will now play their closest rival only once next year).

In this week's review section, we congratulate The Czech Republic, The Republic of Ireland, Portugal and Croatia on Euro 2012 qualification

Note: There is a print link embedded within this post, please visit this post to print it. | Subscribe: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

In this week's review section, we congratulate The Czech Republic, The Republic of Ireland, Portugal and Croatia on Euro 2012 qualification, while Guus leaves Turkey and Suarez makes the back pages for the wrong reason.

Join the guys as they review United's last dismal push at the end of the season. They also grade overall player performances, pick their best 11 and review the play-offs and make their predictions for the upcoming MLS Cup between the Los Angeles Galaxy and the Houston Dynamo.

On this week's predictions we look at three of the vital play-off games for the European Championships, as well as a selection of World Cup 2014 qualifiers.

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On this week's predictions we look at three of the vital play-off games for the European Championships, as well as a selection of World Cup 2014 qualifiers. You can listen to Damon and Damian discussing their predictions on this week's show.

Well as I said earlier, that was gutting, but here are some stats from the game, including a couple nice marks being hit.
The loss was KC's first home playoff loss since 1997, the team had gone unbeaten for 12 games since their 3-0 home loss to Colorado.
CJ Sapong tied a team record for appearances in a season with 40.

Photo by Chris Canetti

Following Sunday afternoon's 2-0 victory over Sporting Kansas City in the 2011 MLS Cup Eastern Conference Final, members of the Houston Dynamo shared their thoughts on the win and the upcoming MLS Cup Final with Simon Borg of MLSSoccer.com.

The Houston Dynamo will be facing the Los Angeles Galaxy in the 2011 MLS Cup Final on Sunday November 20th at the Home Depot Center in Carson, California.

Today the MLS Cup finalists will be decided and two teams will earn humble silverware with a conference championship. Sporting Kansas City and the Houston Dynamo will square off to decide the East while the LA Galaxy and Real Salt Lake square off to decide the West. For the first time in what seems like ages, teams from the east and west are playing in their respective conference championships.

Photo by Katy Umaña

The Houston Dynamo beat the Philadelphia Union on Thursday night, 1-0, to advance to the 2011 MLS Cup Eastern Conference Semifinal. This episode of The Zygo Soccer Report features raw post-match audio from Stuart Holden, Chris Canetti, Bobby Boswell, Adam Moffat, Brad Davis, Brian Ching, and Dominic Kinnear.

The Houston Dynamo took a 1 goal aggregate advantage home to Robertson Stadium to face the Philadelphia Union in front of an Orange clad 24,749 fans in what was the final MLS match ever at Robertson Stadium.
The Philadelphia Union made some head scratching line-up changes for the second match in a row that left many question Peter Nowak's strategy.

Photo by Katy Umaña

On April 2, 2006, over 25,400 sports fans packed into Robertson Stadium on the University of Houston campus to see the first ever MLS match to ever be played in Houston. The match featured the newly minted Houston Dynamo, formerly the San Jose Earthquakes, hosting the Colorado Rapids and the star of the night was a Hawaiian forward named Brian Ching who scored the first goal and then three more in the 5-2 Dynamo victory.

The second leg of the Galaxy/Red Bulls series started off with a bang. Luke Rodgers found the back of the net just four minutes in and brought the teams level on aggregate. From there, MLS fans were treated to a fantastic display worthy of the playoffs.
Mike Magee played hero in responding with his second goal of the series.

For ten minutes it was there. The passion, the drive and the aggression that have inspired the team to so many tough wins was nearly palpable. It may have been palpable, because who knows what else kept knocking Brian Ching over.

And though the Union never, ever gave up, Houston survived the early pressure and then there was no way through for Philadelphia.

Sporting KC's opponent for the conference final on Sunday has been decided. The Houston Dynamo defeated the Philadelphia Union 1-0 tonight in Houston to win their series 3-1 on aggregate. The Dynamo now travel to KC to play on Sunday against KC. The winner will earn a trip to MLS Cup and a birth in next year's CONCACAF Champion's League.

As expected, the Rapids season ended last night. It was always going to be an uphill battle and the mountain just got too steep.
Colorado started 6 regulars, 2 backups, and 3 reserves and Kansas City took full advantage. On a free kick in the first half they found the open area that Drew Moor normally fills, and Palguta failed to fill last night.

by Pedro Gomes
The Colorado Rapids headed into Live Strong Sporting Park to face Sporting Kansas City down 2 goals and a handful of starters. They had a difficult task ahead of them and the 18,565 fans and heavy rain were not going to make it any easier for them. Sporting got the first couple of chances in the match and in the 28' converted on one of those.

(Photo: Daniel Gajdamowicz)

What: Philadelphia Union v Houston Dynamo

When: 8:30pm EST

Where: Robertson Stadium, Houston, TX, USA

Why: GAME ON!

TV: ESPN2, ESPN3, ESPN-Deportes

Referee: Ricardo Salazar

Messing with Texas

Despite the number of times Texas has rudely suggested we not mess with it, Thursday, November 3, 2011 needs to go down in future Union lore as the day the Union went down to Houston and messed up Houston's game plan, ultimately stealing victory on the road.

Sporting KC moved one step closer to a potential trip to LA and MLS Cup last night when they took out the Colorado Rapids at LIVESTRONG Sporting Park, winning 2-0 on the night and 4-0 on aggregate. The shutout was the team's fourth straight, the most in a row since the team's run to the championship in 2000.

No Olave, No BorchersReal Salt Lake and the Seattle Sounders squared off in what had to be one of the more exciting playoff matches in recent years. Those on the east coast who stayed up and those on around the country who watched bore witness to a near astounding comeback by Seattle that fell just short of triumphant.

Sporting KC are back to business with a quick turnaround as they take on the Colorado Rapids in the second leg of their Eastern Conference semifinal series at LIVESTRONG Sporting Park tomorrow. It'll be interesting to see how Colorado comes out for this game. Three players that started the game in Colorado are now done for the season, Drew Moor, Caleb Folan, and Kosuke Kimura all left the game with injuries.

That's Jamie Smith dressed up as the Mad Hatter for Halloween yesterday.
Another quick turnaround as the Rapids face the end of their season tomorrow in Kansas City. Down 2 goals Colorado mus win by 2 to force overtime and PKs or 3 to win and move on. On top of the other problems a storm is rolling into KC tomorrow night (probably the front edge of what's rolling into Denver tonight) which could make the game sloppy.

Leg two of the MLS Eastern Conference Semifinals match-up between the Houston Dynamo and Philadelphia Union takes place at Robertson Stadium in Houston at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday November 3, 2011, and in preparation for the match, the City of Houston will be holding a Rally to support the Dynamo, who won the 2006 and 2007 MLS Cups, on Wednesday November 2, 2011.

Lots of good stats from the game last night, including a landmark goal by Teal Bunbury.
In 6 games at Dick's Sporting Goods Park, this is KC's first win there. It was KC's first win in Colorado since 6/9/2004 when Josh Wolff scored a 90th minute penalty kick.
Teal Bunbury's two goals were only the 3rd time in team history a KC player has scored multiple goals in the playoffs, the other two times, Miklos Molnar in 2000 and Davy Arnaud in 2004.

Last night the soccer gods turned away from the Rapids. I'd say they were too busy with golden boy Tebow, but he might have had a worse day than the Rapids. As a Seahawks fan I feel no sympathy. :D A combination of a lack of offense and bad luck really destroyed Colorado's hopes of repeating.
The home side controlled play for most of the first half, but as we've seen in recent games, they could not convert that into goals.

photo courtesy of Jarred Donalson
Sporting KC took a big first step in the playoffs on Sunday night in Colorado as they took out the Rapids 2-0 in the first leg of their home and home series. With the second leg at home at LIVESTRONG Sporting Park, KC is firmly in the driver's seat in the series.

MLS 2021 Playoff brackets are set... Go Oklahoma!We have never made any bones about it - we don't like playoffs in football... unless you're trying to get promoted to the Premiership (hello West Ham). Playoffs that decide a "champion" after a long, hard season is wrong on many levels but such is life in North America.

Those crazy kids over at TMZ managed to get their hands on pictures of Amanda Knox wearing a Seattle Sounders scarf, along with her Halloween outfit. Considering Knox has played the beautiful game, not surprising that she's pulling for the home team in the MLS playoffs (though Real Salt Lake beat them up pretty good, 3-0, this weekend).