August 7, 2007

Randomness

Not quite Sprinkles, but just some points I wanted to get out there for discussion as I try to get used to the Eastern time zone again...
  • Danny Szetela to Roma? Very interesting that a guy who can't crack the lineup for the Village People goes to a Champions League quarterfinalist. Is that Sigi's fault, or Danny's? He looked great for the US in the U20's, both at the World Cup and in the qualifying earlier in the year. I want to see where Roma loans him to start his Italian journey, I'm assuming he won't step into the first team at the Olimpico.
  • Benny Feilhaber to Derby County? I'm not quite as sure on this one. I think it's better than him playing with the reserves in Germany, but Derby? I don't see them staying up this year, so what does he do then? At the least, it will be good experience for him in a different style of play. I would've liked to have seen Benny end up in a more technical league though, I think he would've learned more.
  • It's not being announced, but rumors are out there that the Silverbacks have made some roster changes. We saw that Macoumba Kandji made his USL D1 debut over the weekend, but we haven't seen any announcement on who was cleared off the roster to make room for him. Macoumba looked really dangerous out there from the little I was able to catch on USL Live, although I'd love to see him up front with Antoniuk.
  • I was able to catch the second half of the Seattle-Puerto Rico match while I was out there on Saturday. It's weird seeing a USL game in an NFL stadium. The acoustics were great, the Seattle supporters sounded really good. Qwest is a beautiful stadium. If Starfire had a bigger stadium, I think it would be more suitable though. Any Seattle folks care to comment here?
  • Peter Villegas of Puerto Rico is fun to watch live. Between him and Kandji, it should be a fun one for FSC at the RE/MAX this Friday night.
  • It's a real shame when people consider a dissenting opinion to be a personal attack, especially when it's done on a discussion board. Isn't that the whole point of "discussion"?
  • Will Beckham play this week in DC? I'd like to see it, but I'd rather see him get fully healthy first. He's signed a 5 year contract people, not 5 weeks.
  • I'm really looking forward to the Houston-Pachuca rematch in the SuperLiga semis next Tuesday night. I love that the MLS teams get another shot at the Mexican teams that knocked them out of CONCACAF this year, Houston in SuperLiga and DC in the Sudamericana. That will go a long way to ratcheting up the rivalry between the Mexican and American clubs.
  • Seattle's on top of the USL D1, but I don't think that they're all that great. They're pretty limited in what they can do, I think Portland's defense makes them a slightly better team. The league is wide open at this point though.
  • Speaking of wide open leagues, MLS is also a crapshoot. Bruce Arena said this like he was surprised, what do you expect in a league with a salary cap? The designated player option will start to change this, but it hasn't happened yet. What's Bruce bitching about anyway, he has two DP's? Well, Claudio Reyna is getting paid like a DP, but he isn't performing like one. You've gotta love those backpasses...
  • LATE ADDITION: I talk trash about the Sounders, and then they go out and absolutely hammer the Rapids in the Open Cup. It's 5-0 Seattle in the 75th minute. People have been calling for Clavijo's head for a while now, I think this has to be the last straw. Up until this year, I've been a big supporter of what Clavijo has accomplished in Colorado. I thought he got the absolute most out of the limited amount of talent he had. This year, he's had more talent than usual, but has obviously lost the team somewhere along the way. You just can't lose 5-0 to a team in a lower division in a Cup match, it's just not supposed to happen. Adios Fernando...
My brain is now closer to empty. I'll try to back on a semi-regular schedule around here, I promise...

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Seattle has beaten Portland three times this year. That makes them better than Portland.
Queeley was dropped from the Silverbacks squad. Colorado really looked bad tonight and it hard to believe that they are an MLS team.

Longshoe said...

- I think Portland is a better team than Seattle, but I haven't seen all of either team's games either. Sometimes a team just has your number. I don't think the US national team is that much better than Mexico, but we keep handling them. Argentina is also in Mexico's head, but then El Tri turns around and always seems to play well against Brazil. It's odd how these things work out. Going by points per game, Portland is still on top of the league. Who is Seattle's bogey team?

- I know what I've heard about roster changes, but it's just a shame that it's not announced. That's what professional teams do, announce roster changes. People didn't know Kandji's situation unless you asked him, and even then didn't know he was going to play on Saturday until he ended up in uniform.

- I didn't get to see any of the Rapids game tonight, the score shocked the hell out of me. I don't see how Clavijo keeps his job after that, unless it really is true that the Rapids don't want to pay for 2 coaches this year.

Anonymous said...

For some reason the Silverbacks owners feel that it is necessary to keep certain details about the team from the fans. I think the Kandji situation was a real sensitive one and they were afraid of a backlash from the league. It is hard to understand their motives about certain issues because sometimes they make announcements and sometimes not.

Anonymous said...

Seattle has lost to both Montreal and Vancouver twice this year.

Longshoe said...

I understand there were issues with Kandji being able to play as a professional, due to his immigration status. I think it could've been explained at least, I had a lot of people asking me after his performances against Monterrey and Cruz Azul what the deal was.

A simple, "Macoumba Kandji's paperwork has been completed and he's now able to participate in league play," would've sufficed. As well, explaining that he is trying to acquire a work permit to be able to play would've been nice.

I know it was more complicated than that, or at least I hope it was, but some kind of word would've been nice.

Making these types of announcements, signings and releases, etc. give reporters something to write about. Otherwise, why should they bother? I know the standard complaint comes back that they're not getting coverage, so why go to the trouble? They have to make the media's job as easy as possible and reach out to them.

The media is not obligated to write about them when there's a core support of about 2000 people who come out regularly. The coverage that they do get is going to have to come from hustle and effort.