History of German Soccer... I Mean, Football
A little video that seemed appropriate with Euro2008 kicking off tomorrow.
Friday, June 06, 2008
Wednesday, June 04, 2008
Dallas, Everton, KC, and Galaxy
There's been a lot going on lately. Euro 2008 is about to get started. The US Men are going to play Spain in a friendly. Southampton's coaching situation is an even bigger mess with Nigel Pearson's contract not renewed and the new coach, that Dutch P guy, apparently still under contract someplace else (I thought Lowe was going to clean up the mess instead of adding to it). The Rapids are taking on Kansas City in the US Open Cup. Tickets for the fancy-pants scrimmage between Everton and the Rapids go on sale in a few hours.
As for last week's FC Dallas game, well, I hope they can repeat that performance against the Galaxy. In theory they should be able to. The Rapids didn't let FC Dallas' midfield do very much. On paper they should be able to do the same again. Then again, we're talking about Clavijo's tactics versus Guillit's. That doesn't seem to bode as well for the Rapids.
We Want Rapidman was happy for the win but wasn't overly impressed by it. More by Nick here.
FC Rocky looks at the Dallas match noting the sloppy defending by the Rapids. He also mentions that, and I agree, Rapids' Scottish striker Tom McManus may be emerging as a player that can score goals when the team needs them. More on that at FC Rocky.
View From The Couch looks back at the match at Dicks Sporting Goods Park against FC Dallas. He notes 2 interesting facts :
1) This is the first time we've given up a lead this season.
2) Its also the first time we've won when allowing the opposition to score.
More from View From The Couch on the game here.
FC Rocky is passing on some comments from a fellow Rocky Mountain News employee who is in Italy and went to see Pisa and Bologna play. Are the marketers paying attention to this?
"To me, it's kind of how sports used to be when we were growing up without all of the annoying music, dancers, blimps flying around etc. Just the passion for the game."
More on the Colorado Rapids - Kansas US Open Cup game at The Offside.
Monday, June 02, 2008
Colorado Rapids - Frisco Burn : Part 1
One of the many things that was more interesting that most of the Rapids - FC Dallas game yesterday.
Friday, May 30, 2008
Pearson Out, Poortvliet
It looks like Nigel Pearson got a big "thank you for saving us from relegation" today in the form of being shown the door. Southampton announced that they will not renew Nigel Pearson's short term contract that comes due in a month. Instead they will be bringing in Jan Poortvliet. Who? I was wondering the same. Poortvliet's CV has clubs like Den Bosch, Roosendaal and Stormvogels Telstar. Seeing a new gaffer in charge who's biggest club managed is Southampton isn't exactly the sort of thing to get the fans excited.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Clavijo's Mediocrity Marches On
With the Rapids loss to Chivas USA at Dicks Sporting Goods Park, they have yet to win 2 games in a row in 2008. At least in 2007 they pulled off a couple of winning streaks. One was 3 games and the other was 2 games. Not much to brag about? Yep. But so far 2008 hasn't been much better.
This loss really gets my goat. Somehow the Colorado Rapids didn't manage to own this game. Chivas USA was missing an entire backline (Suarez, Thomas, Vaughn, Zotinka). They were playing a 3-5-2 because, well, they didn't really have any other choice (Or did Preki actually trying calling that a 3-4-3?).
They were also missing Galindo, Wicky, Alecko, and Bornstein. Heck, Razov wasn't ready to make a start Saturday night. In 2007 we were told one of the few bright spots was the defense. Folks pointed at their GA and said they were 3rd best. But as I mentioned awhile ago in a post here , I thought there were more problems than the GA was letting on to. We painfully witnessed that Saturday Night when the defense allowed 2 goals despite Chivas USA fielding a 19 year old kid and Attiba "2 brick feet" Harris. With the injuries, the altitude and being away from home Chivas USA had no business tieing this game let alone winning it. This was a game begging for the Rapids to score a handful of goals and to rack up another clean sheet. Somehow the Rapids made sure that wasn't the case.
What will it take for the Rapids to start playing like a better team? Do they really have that much less talent than other teams? Is Clavijo making good use of Christian Gomez? Does Terry Cooke need to start? Is this the last year we see Jacob Peterson in the MLS? Was this just a case of Preki out coaching Clavijo?
But the main question I want to hear answered is this : Why does Clavijo play a 3-5-2 only for the team to turn around and spend 1/2 of their passes trying to hurry up and knock the ball 3/4th of the way up the field in the air? That is, what good is the 3-5-2 when the players are so prone to playing long balls?
Highlights from the game including Tom McManus' incredible 35-yard goal :
More on the Chivas USA - Rapids game:
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