"Goodbye pal... And yeah, He's cool."PLAYERS CUT, PUNS TO GO UNUSED
A sad day for four young men as Toronto FC made their first four cuts of pre-season today. Sadder still is the effect it will have on blogs as some quality nicknames will forever go stale in Toronto.

Fulham midfielder Clint Dempsey has made it clear that he would like his long-term future to be at a club with Champions League aspirations, alerting many potential suitors to make a move for the U.S. international.

Dempsey has scored nine goals in 22 matches so far this season, with his most recent accomplishment being a remarkable hat-trick the first for an American in the Premier League against Newcastle United.

The US "Camp Cupcake" roster closed out their camp down in Panama today with a 1-0 win thanks to a goal by Sporting KC midfielder, Graham Zusi. Like the game on Saturday against Venezuela, both Zusi and Teal Bunbury started for the United States, while CJ Sapong found himself starting on the bench. The US got a good start, as Zusi finished off a chance in the 8th minute to give the US a 1-0 lead.

Last night in Arizona, the US national team topped Venezuela in the first of two friendlies for the camp cupcake roster, 1-0 thanks to a late goal by Ricardo Clark. Sporting KC forward Teal Bunbury and midfielder Graham Zusi both started for the US, while forward, CJ Sapong came on as a second half sub, replacing Zusi.

Last night I watched an interesting and rather entertaining friendly match between the USA and Venezuela. As this is not season for FIFA encounters, both teams largely played with their reserve side, but it was interesting nevertheless, as both nations are in a very good process of preparing for their World Cup qualifiers under two very good coaches, Cesar Farias from Venezuela and (the German)

Last night the US national team once again scrimmaged the US under 23 team in Carson, California. And once again for the US, Graham Zusi got a goal as the US tied 1-1 with their U-23 counterparts.
Teal Bunbury and CJ Sapong were also involved in the game. Bunbury spent the first half on the field with the U23 team, as they continue to prepare for Olympic qualifying.

Soccer fans! This Saturday come out to Mickey Byrnes in Hollywood to check out USA vs Venezuela at 9PM. Come join the American Outlaws South Florida for a great night of fun and prizes, starting with a PS3 FIFA '12 championship prior to the game. (Starting at 7 pm)
During half time of the USA vs Venezuela game the Ultras, South Florida's premiere soccer supporters group, will be giving away 4 tickets to the Mexico vs Colombia game scheduled for February 29, 2012 at Sun Life Stadium in Miami.

Last night, the US men's national team took on the US under 23 team in a scrimmage in LA. Both teams are currently involved in camps. The US team for their upcoming games against Venezuela and Panama, and the U23's as they continue to prepare for their upcoming Olympic qualifying. Three Sporting KC players appeared for the full national team last night.

USA's Shannon Box controls the ball during a U.S. women's national training camp earlier this week. The squad has started preparing for the Olympics in August this year. Get it girl! / via Reuters

Tweet This Post

Video- Tim Howard goal vs Bolton Everton 2012 4 January- GK goal from own half is a post from Soccer Blogger. Follow Soccer Blogger on Twitter

Video- Tim Howard goal vs Bolton Everton 2012 4 January- GK goal from own half is a post from Soccer Blogger. Follow Soccer Blogger on Twitter This stunning Tim Howard goal vs Bolton ( see video goal below) saw the American goalkeeper become only the fourth goalie to score a goal in the Premiership after [.

Jürgen Klinsmann trying too hard to Europeanize U.S. team - originally posted on Soccerlens.com

Thursday was the five-month anniversary of Jürgen Klinsmann's appointment as head coach of the United States men's national team. In that short time, he has presided over seven games and has a paltry 2-1-4 record.

Three Sporting KC players have been called up by Jurgen Klinsmann for the upcoming US Men's national team camp in Phoenix and Los Angeles. Teal Bunbury returns to the US national team, having been a part of the quite a few of Klinsmann last few squads, although he's yet to make an appearance for the national team under the new manager.

photo courtesy of Jarred Donalson
Some national team news has come out today regarding two Sporting KC players. First, Teal Bunbury has been called up by Caleb Porter to the upcoming U-23 Olympic camp in Florida. The camp will take place December 15th through the 23rd. The camp is in preparation for the upcoming Olympic qualifying.

Slovenia vs USA Soccer Score 2-3 Highlights Video Goals 2011 Friendly Buddle Dempsey is a post from Soccer Blogger. Follow Soccer Blogger on Twitter

Slovenia vs USA Soccer Score 2-3 Highlights Video Goals 2011 Friendly Buddle Dempsey is a post from Soccer Blogger. Follow Soccer Blogger on Twitter Slovenia vs USA 2011 ( Slovenia vs United States 2011 video below) Final score and result:- Slovenia vs USA 2-3 ( Matavz*2/ Buddle, Dempsey, Altidore pen) Stadio Stozice, Ljubljana, 15th November, [.

Photo by Osvaldo Aguilar/ISIphotos.com

The U.S. men's national team will play its final match of 2011 in Slovenia on Tuesday, but there's already an eye on 2012.

According to the Panamanian football federation, the United States and Panama will meet for a friendly in Panama City on January 25.

With David Beckham's future well and truly up in the air amidst rumors that he could be set to join PSG, Tottenham, QPR, or even stay with the Galaxy, it is perhaps time for a proper summary of what the English legend has brought to the professional game in America.

When Becks left the Santiago Bernabeu five years ago for the American West Coast, many thought he was crazy and taking a huge step down; and whilst Major League Soccer has not yet become the destination of the world's top players, Beckham has helped to at least draw big names to the league to increase its profile.

France vs USA 2011 Score 1-0 Highlights Video Goal Remy is a post from Soccer Blogger. Follow Soccer Blogger on Twitter

France vs USA 2011 Score 1-0 Highlights Video Goal Remy is a post from Soccer Blogger. Follow Soccer Blogger on Twitter France vs USA 2011 ( France vs United States 2011) Score and result:- France vs USA 1-0 ( Loic Remy) Stade de France, Paris- 11 November, 2011- International soccer friendly Loic Remy's second half [.

Yesterday it was announced that Teal Bunbury had been added to Caleb Porter's roster for the upcoming U23 camp in Germany. Today Thad brought us the news that Bunbury will not be traveling to Germany. According to Bunbury in the article, he's been suffering from an ankle injury for a while. Bunbury didn't want to go into the camp and not perform well or make excuses for his ankle.

United States manager Jurgen Klinsmann will lead his side into a highly anticipated friendly fixture against Les Bleus in Paris on Friday evening and hopes to see the man who once taught him invaluable lessons in France Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger.

Wenger coached Klinsmann for two years in Monaco and although the former Germany international striker had already enjoyed prolific spells at Stuttgart and Inter Milan earlier in his career, his stint in the Ligue 1 made him enjoy attacking football on a whole new level.

Teal Bunbury will join Sporting KC goalkeeper, Jon Kempin in Germany this week for the US U23 camp. As teams have been eliminated from the MLS Cup playoffs, new U23 coach, Caleb Porter has been calling in players from those teams for the camp as well. Porter is Bunbury's old college coach at Akron.

American standout Brek Shea has secured an offseason training arrangement with Premier League champions, exciting fans who have followed the 21 year old's quick rise to fame.

Shea currently plies his trade in Major League Soccer for FC Dallas, and has already found himself in Jurgen Klinsmann's United States national team squad.

Another day of international duty for Sporting KC players today. Four players had national team duty today, three of them started. The one to not start, didn't even appear for his country, as Teal Bunbury didn't make the bench again for the United States in their 1-0 loss to Ecuador tonight in New York.

Good first half. Familiar lack of finishing. Weak second and predictably punished. The defense did look better organized (at least until Bocanegra left) though uncomfortable against the quick counter, something that should have Mexico salivating. Anyway, just a few thoughts...
* Chandler looked really impressive at the problem left back spot.

The haters of Miami as a soccer town were out in full force last week as it was announced that fewer than 6800 tickets had been sold for the USA vs Honduras game to be played at Sun Life Stadium. The game hadn't even been played yet and already they were bashing.
In the end over 21,000 showed up on a wet night to watch the United states defeat Honduras 1-0 thanks to a wonderful goal by Clint Dempsey.

A win, 1-0 over a second-tier CONCACAF side, and probably just about a deserved one, though by no means hugely impressive. The US showed well in patches against Honduras, and a couple of individuals can be proud of their performances, but collectively, the one word that consistently appears in my notes, often double- or triple-underlined, is sloppy.

Roger Espinoza put in another solid performance for Honduras going 74 minutes, but Honduras fell to the US 1-0 tonight down in Miami on a nice finish by Clint Dempsey. Sporting KC's other player involved in this game, Teal Bunbury, did not make the 18 man US roster for the game tonight. Espinoza played the role that he's made his own for Honduras as of late.

This Saturday October 8, 2011 at 6 PM the United States Men's National team will play a friendly game against Honduras. We ask all soccer fans in South Florida to show up and support the beautiful game. Tickets are still available. Be sure to visit ussoccer to get your tickets.
If you want to sit with the American Outlaws and the rest of the supporters they will be in section GA 156.

To go along with Roger Espinoza's call up for Honduras, four more Wizards players have been called up to represent their respective national teams. Teal Bunbury, Peterson Joseph, Craig Rocastle, and Shavar Thomas have all been called up to the US, Haiti, Grenada, and Jamaica respectively.
The biggest games of the international break are for Joseph and Rocastle whose national teams have two World Cup qualifiers.

My affinity toward Landon Donovan is remarkably simple: He's about my height and about my age. It's enough to create a bond in my brain.

I suppose if I grew up in Europe the success he's found in athletics despite his small stature might not surprise me quite so. But I didn't, so it does. The kids born across the pond in the early 1980s had little guys such as Baggio (five-nine) and Scholes (five-seven) to adore after Johan Cruyff (five-eleven) led the way, but American sporting heroes of the 1990s were larger than life and simply huge.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Someone (me) once said (just now, for real) that American soccer is a question in search of a question mark. But who asked that question, and what other punctuation might it contain? To find out, we deployed two brilliant young sportswriters, the latest in electronic-communications technology, and the copy-paste function.

While Sporting KC was on the road in Salt Lake, LIVESTRONG Sporting Park was in use by the US women's national team. In their first game since the World Cup this summer, the women drew over 16,000 fans to LSP last night for the first game of their celebration series. The US got the first goal of the game off of an Abby Wambach penalty after a hand ball in the box on Canada.

10 years ago the US played Costa Rica at Arrowhead Stadium in KC. It was my first trip to see the team in person and a game that I will never forget. At that time, it was difficult to find US games on TV (many games were on pay-per-view if they were broadcast at all) and you had to scour the internet for hours just to find any news relating to the team.

photo courtesy of Jarred Donalson
According to Steven Goff at Soccer Insider, Teal Bunbury will be returning to KC following the United States 1-0 loss to Costa Rica. Bunbury will not be going to Belgium for the second game of the international break. Bunbury's return doesn't mean that he'll be available for the game on Monday against LA.

Granted, these early matches under the Klinsmann regime are all about assessing players and introducing the new boss's style, so it's not yet time to go overboard with complaints about players who don't belong, defensive disorganization, and lack of chances created. Sadly, my suspicion is that we're going to have plenty of chances to file those complaints down the road.

USA vs Costa Rica 2011 Score Highlights Video Home Depot Center is a post from Soccer Blogger. Follow Soccer Blogger on Twitter

USA vs Costa Rica 2011 Score Highlights Video Home Depot Center is a post from Soccer Blogger. Follow Soccer Blogger on Twitter USA vs Costa Rica 2011 Final score and result:- USA vs Costa Rica 0-1 ( Rodney Wallace) September 2, 2011- Home Depot Center Rodney Wallace's second half goal earns Costa Rica a surprise [.

It's an international friendly weekend and of the three Sporting KC players with their respective national teams, two had their games tonight. Defender Shavar Thomas and Jamaica took on Ecuador in Quito today. Thomas went the full 90 minutes in Jamaica's 5-2 loss on the road where to MLS players, Omar Cummings and Ryan Johnson got the two goals for the Jamaican team.

By Chi Huynh, writing from Los Angeles

The USA Men's national team held an open training session for fans yesterday at the Home Depot Center, where fans were treated to news that under newly appointed coach, Jürgen Klinsmann, every home game would include an open training session for fans to attend.

Today US Soccer announced the roster for the women's team when they visit KC to take on Canada on September 17th at LIVESTRONG Sporting Park. The roster contains all 21 players from the USA's run to the World Cup final this year in Germany. It'll be a nice doubleheader for those wanting to go out on that Saturday as following the US game they'll be showing the Sporting KC vs Real Salt Lake game.

Lots of international team news was announced today, and 4 Sporting KC players were affected. First, Kei Kamara's call up for the Sierra Leone national team was confirmed by the team today, although I think Kamara tweeting last night that he'd been called up was proof enough that he'd been called up for their African Cup of Nations qualifier against Egypt at home.

(All apologies to Northern Ireland and the Faroes...mostly the poor Faroes.)

Aside from infuriating injuries and some pretty decent highlight goals, anyway.

Shockingly, the happenings actually came from North America. For serious. Where Jurgen Klinsmann somewhat stole the show with his dancing and goal celebrations.