This Friday the world will focus on Cape Town, South Africa as the 32 teams that have qualified for the 2010 World Cup will find out where they will be playing and who. The drawing will be beamed to televisions in over 200 countries. You can watch it live this Friday at 9:00AM on ESPN2.
The US will dawn throw backs for the 2010 World Cup. The design is inspired by the 1950 US World Cup team which shocked the world by beating England 1-nil in Brazil. That one game is still considered one of the biggest upsets in Cup play and one of the greatest moments for the US national team. The game was labeled the Miracle on Grass by Sports Illustrated. British Newspapers thought the score line was a typo and printed headlines that England had won 10-0. Nike has done an excellent job by keeping it simple and tipping their hat to history. After the 1950 World Cup the US would not qualify again for forty years. So tell us what you think of the 2010 uniforms.
This is a list of the 32 nations that have qualified for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. On December 4th, the world's attention will be drawn to Cape Town, South Africa as the Final Draw is held and we see how these teams will be grouped. We will keep you posted on where and when to watch the draw live. You will notcie some results are in bold, these are past cup winners and the amount the amount of Cups won. Something to note that all the nations who have previouly won a world cup have qualified for 2010.
Put down that cheeseburger, drop the milkshake, and quit eating those oreos, because for the second year in a row the Timbers are holding open tryouts January 23-24th.
Over the past few days four more teams qualified for the 2010 World Cup hosted by South Africa. Cameroon a fan favorite is in, New Zealand qualified for only it 2nd WC ever, Nigeria is an African powerhouse and Algeria knocked off Egypt to qualify for the first time since 1986. A total of 32 nations will play in the WC, and we will keep you updated as this list grows.
Unlike other soccer ratings systems, SPI is explicitly designed to be predictive -- so a team like Argentina, which in fact struggled to qualify for the World Cup, won't be penalized that much provided the system is convinced that the talent is still there. The two main innovations in the SPI are to incorporate results from club play -- if Cameroonian striker Samuel Eto'o scores a goal for Inter Milan, it will (marginally) help Cameroon's rating -- as well as to incorporate a "competitiveness coefficient" based on the actual lineups that each team used in each match. The latter is important because international soccer clubs play a lot of matches -- friendlies, some second-tier international tournaments -- in which they're essentially sending their taxi squads in, which tell us very little about the teams that will actually be on the field in South Africa next year.
This is a single game elimination to determine the finalists for the MLS Cup and it begins Friday the 13th at the Home Depot Center. The LA Galaxy will host the Houston Dynamo for the Western Conference Championship. Houston's Brian Ching scored the overtime goal over the flounders to get to this match up. In four years he has led the team in goals and took home two Championships. The Galaxy are the turn around team of the year, as they have gone from the worst team by record in 2008, to being 2nd best in the 2009 regular season. Donovan and Beckham are missing their international friendlies this weekend as they enter their first MLS playoff together. This is a one game battle for the final and will be aired live on ESPN 2 at 8:00pm.
The MLS commissioner Don Garber and Portland Timbers owner Merritt Paulson will be guests on 95.5 show Strong at Night starting at 6pm. This is a great opportunity to hear from the two biggest people making Portland MLS a reality.
Mandjou Kieta is going to top tier Indian club Salgaocar Sport Club on loan during the 2009-10 I-League Division 1 season. Don't worry the scoring champ will be back for the 2010 USL regular season. Salgaocar is six games into their 26 regular game season, their is 1-2-3. So the real question becomes, how many minutes does it take for Keita to score his first goal? We will cover all the latest news about Keita's journey to India.
The US National Team will face fellow 2010 FIFA World Cup qualifiers Slovakia on Saturday, Nov.14 in Bratislava. This game will be televised live on Fox Soccer Channel at 7 AM, so set your damn Tivo. This is an important international friendly match in preparations for the 2010 World Cup. The US will be short some stars as the MLS playoffs are in full swing this weekend, most notably Landon Donovan and Brian Ching. Slovakia finished at the top of a tough qualifying group that included Czech Republic and this will be the nations first World Cup.
Brazil takes on England Saturday, Nov. 14th at 9AM on Fox Soccer Channel, so clear some room on the tivo and catch two great games this Saturday.
The Home Depot Center is located in Carson, California just out side of LA. It is home to the LA Galaxy and Chivas USA of the MLS. The first match was played there in June of 2003. It was developed and is operated by the Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG), this group also runs the Staples Center and a variety of other sports and music venues across the world. You are likely to hear more about AEG in the local news, as it is behind the upcoming renovations in the Rose Quarter.
The Home Depot Center is part of a large 125 acre development the encompasses the soccer stadium, a tennis stadium, track and field as well as many other training facilities used extensively by US Olympic athletes. The Stadium is soccer specific but also hosts lacrosse, football, rugby, concerts and the X-games. For the X-games the place hosts everything from motocross to rally cars.
The official capacity of HDC is listed at 27,000 and it features a large slew of luxury boxes for LA's many rich and spoiled fans. The stadium has a partial roof that surrounds three sides of the field. The attendance figures for the Galaxy and Chivas are some of the best in the league. The stadium hosts the Honda SuperClasico, the MLS's only true local derby. The Galaxy has won 4 out of the 5 SuperClassicos. The intensity of this rivalry was upped this post season as they face each other in first round of the MLS playoffs. The first leg was a draw and the the second leg will be this Sunday with the winner going on to the Western Conference Finals.
The first leg of the first round of the MLS playoffs have been determined. The second leg of the playoffs will begin this Thursday in Columbus. In the first round of this knockout tournament, aggregate goals over two matches will determine the winners. We will keep you updated.
