Last week on the blog we mentioned the U-17s trip to Spain to participate in the AGS Cup. The team earned two victories and two ties to finish in second place. The team started off the tournament with a 1-1 tie against Mexico with a goal from Chris Lema (New York Red Bulls) before playing the United Arab Emirates to the same scoreline, courtesy of an Herber Mejia-Flores (McLean Youth Soccer) goal.

Quietly FC Dallas man Brek Shea has wormed his way up the Major League Soccer goal scoring chart, sitting just one behind Red Bulls' Thierry Henry, with nine goals to his name. His strike against Toronto FC was bombastic and made even more satisfying as he broke the ankles of TFC's new DP (and "worst person in the world") Torsten Frings.

Kind of a slow news day for the Timbers, well at least yesterday was. Seems like the only thing anybody is talking about with regards to the team is Darlington Nagbe's goal and, well, there's only so many articles you can read about a single goal, as fantastic as it was regardless.

Other news today focuses around Sporting KC's rise to prominence and how they only have a few road games left and some player speculation outside of the Timbers.

Ellis McLoughlin didn't need long to make an impact for the San Jose Earthquakes.

The 20-year-old forward, who played youth soccer in Madison, scored his first Major League Soccer goal in the Earthquakes' 2-1 victory over the New England Revolution on Saturday night in San Jose, Calif.

I would like to first observe a moment of reflection. Ten years after experiencing the most horribly tragic event ever on American soil, the man responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent Americans - and countless others of innumerable nations in other incidents - was tracked down and killed in Pakistan late Sunday night.

I toured the stadium the day before the announcement of the partnership with LIVESTRONG.Part 2 will be coming later today...A view of the goal area in front of the supporters section. The two round concrete pieces furthest from the stand and out in the brown gravel are the mounts for rugby posts. The two concrete mount points just at the edge of the gravel is for the front of the soccer goal.