It galls me to say this, but here goes..."Thank you, Revs." And not just for ending Columbus' hot
streak but for providing a timely reminder to United. The schedule-radar is congested with low
hanging fruit, but this is precisely the time of year when teams with the pressure of post-season
contention off their shoulders love to play the role of spoiler.
RSL is playing to not be a wild card team this weekend. (Getty Images)
It has been a long season and we have come down to this, one final weekend of games. The New
York Red Bulls kind of took some of the sting out of the weekend with their 1-0 win last night over
the Philadelphia Union.
Still there are some games with meaning this weekend.
Tonight, the New England Revolution will take on the Seattle Sounders in a match where the Revs
are battling for postseason relevance. Mathematically, anyway. Realistically, they're trying to
play spoiler and get a couple of good performances at home in the books to close the door on what
has been a most disappointing and dismal season to date.
Sorry this is coming out so late, but next week we should be on a much tighter schedule as we've
signed up an engineer (@danoseattle) who we hope will help make the show better and keep us
publishing a little faster. Aaaaaaannnnnnyyyyyway, we have a show and we think it's a good one.
We talk a lot about the Cascadia Cup and even have ECS Travel Director Aaron Reed
(@ECSTravelMonkey) on for a rather lengthy discussion about the trip and away support in
general.
Sorry this is coming out so late, but next week we should be on a much tighter schedule as we've
signed up an engineer (@danoseattle) who we hope will help make the show better and keep us
publishing a little faster. Aaaaaaannnnnnyyyyyway, we have a show and we think it's a good one.
We talk a lot about the Cascadia Cup and even have ECS Travel Director Aaron Reed
(@ECSTravelMonkey) on for a rather lengthy discussion about the trip and away support in
general.
Philadelphia hosts rivals New England tonight. (Getty Images)
I will try to keep this one fairly brief. Both the New England Revolution and the Philadelphia
Union come into tonight's midweek clash a bit on the downside. Neither club has come into this
match on a hot streak of any kind.
But here we are, with at least the Union in playoff contention at the moment.
Well here is the last bastion of hope for any hardware this season and hopefully Portland can
play the role of spoiler for the rest of the season. For those of you who don't remember the
standings for the Cascadia Cup head here. The question I have been thinking about is can Portland
do something it hasn't done since July 3rd?
After the second round of group stage games, we have reached the final roulette of matches
before nations start getting eliminated (two have already clinched failure to advance past the
group stage.) Almost every game has implications as to whether a team's knockout-stage hopes will
be realized or be a mere dream.
Piranhas look to remain unbeaten at home when Northern Virginia visits the Sportsplex tomorrow
night.
The Virginia Beach Piranhas look to get their offense back on track when they host the Northern
Virginia Majestics at the Virginia Beach Sportsplex Wednesday night. The Piranhas were held
scoreless for only the second time this season during Saturday's 0-0 tie vs Fredericksburg.
The Comets once again faced an expansion team making their home debut. Once again, they relished
playing the role of spoiler as they control play from the start and go home with a 13-4 win. Ryan
Junge led the team with 5 points on two goals, Vahid Assadpour chipped in two of his own, Leo
Gibson and newly signed Cristiano each had one as well.
This is the second in a series where we take off our Fulham hats, put on music-blogging
hats, and suggest a band to check out this summer. Apologies if you think our selections suck, but
we'd rather write about this than complain about our lack of forwards when it is only June
20th.
Tennis is one of those bands that you secretly enjoy but dare not tell anyone.
This is the second in a series where we take off our Fulham hats, put on music-blogging
hats, and suggest a band to check out this summer. Apologies if you think our selections suck, but
we'd rather write about this than complain about our lack of forwards when it is only June
20th.
Tennis is one of those bands that you secretly enjoy but dare not tell anyone.
Clint Dempsey will try to add to his record breaking goal-scoring pace today when Fulham takes
on Liverpool today (2:55pm, ESPN2).
Liverpool enters the match still trying to catch Manchester City for the final Champions League
place in England, but Fulham will look to play spoiler as Dempsey returns from a slight injury that
kept him out of Fulham's last match.
Mirko Vucinic's cool finish and Marco Borriello's strike ensured Juve's 28th Scudetto as Inter
played spoiler in the San Siro derby. It was their first Scudetto since the 2006 Calciopoli scandal
saw them stripped off their title and resulting in relegation.
The title was also coach Antonio Conte's first and it came in his debut season with
Juventus.
Yaya Toure was a one man wrecking crew in City's win over Utd on Monday without scoring a goal.
Against Newcastle he continued in the same vein and scored a brace. The first was a sublime piece
of precision and placement. Roberto Mancini won the tactical battle against Sir Alex and this time
too his decision to take off an ineffective Samir Nasri and introduce Nigel de Jong to patrol the
backfield gave free rein to Toure's attacking instincts.
The mind games have started. The pod begins their own this week, as Laurence quizzes the podders
with Opta quiz questions, play along (spoiler, you'll win.) Along with that the cast look at City,
Liverpool and Arsenal: with such diverse ...
This is a content summary. Visit http://www.epltalk.
We start today with the very bad news that our favorite Brazilian, Andre Santos, will be out for
at least 3 months due to required surgery on his right ankle. As you all know, he suffered this
injury during our CL dead-rubber against Olympiakos- an unfortunate injury that could have been
prevented.
Alcohol is not merely a constituent of a good party. Rather, it's the party's host.
Shay Given knows this, which is why he issued a call to the Republic of Ireland fans before
last night's Euro 2012 qualifier vs. Armenia to hit the booze. Shay apparently felt that a wee
dram or ten might help the faithful blow the roof off the stadium and simultaneously propel the
team to victory.
Spoiler alert: Exactly what's going to happen in the 2011-12 Championship season is a post from:
Just Football
The Football League season's eight-day head start on the Premier League provides a rare chance
for clubs in the second tier and below to bask in the limelight.
The national media will respond to the nation's collective anticipation of the new season by
lavishing attention on the Championship, League One and League Two for a weekend, before their
heads are quickly turned back to the big boys.
1. Â Bob Bradley's lineup will look a lot like the one we saw against Panama, with a couple of
exceptions. While it would be ideal to start Clint Dempsey up top, the decision is really between
Juan Agudelo and Sacha Kljestan. Â Since Sacha had a fairly bad game against Panama, we're going to
say Juan gets the nod.
1. Â Bob Bradley's lineup will look a lot like the one we saw against Panama, with a
couple of exceptions. While it would be ideal to start Clint Dempsey up
top, the decision is really between Juan Agudelo and Sacha
Kljestan.
Full Version of Fredy's MLS 36 Episode for those, like me, who don't have cable and missed out
on the fun. Spoiler alert: Sigi is the best. (Credit: MLS36 Fredy Montero from 441 Productions on
Vimeo)
Hmph. Well, shows how much I know. I spend all last week gushing about the Scorpions, and how they
are clearly the best team in the NASL, and they can't be beat, and blah, gush, gasp, ooh and aah,
and what do you know? I went into that game giving Puerto Rico a roughly 1% chance of winning after
coming off a mid-week tilt in CONCACAF Champions League play, a game in which they played away to
Isidro Metapan, and guess what?
Kyle Helton and Mjondalen hope to play spoiler to Honefoss in their push to promotion while
Jonathan Borrajo could return from injury to give Ham-Kam a push in their own quest to reach the
Tippeligaen.
Toronto FC finally put it all together against the Columbus Crew.
TFC put an end to its Trillium Cup nightmare by posting a 4-2 victory over the Crew for its
first win in the rivalry series in 13 matches (1-5-7) and a performance worthy of SBI's MLS Team of
the Week honors.
I know disparate opinions exist on mid-season friendlies that match MLS sides against the
fancy-pants sides from Europe and Mexico. I'm on record as saying, essentially, they once held
great value as MLS established its brand, they still hold some value ... but that the value will
gradually diminish.
