November 26, 2007
The LA Galaxy World Tour starring David Beckham continues as over 80,000 are expected to be on hand when the Galaxy take on Sydney FC Tuesday.
Beckham hopes to play a full 90 for the Galaxy after coming on as a sub in England's 3-2 loss to Croatia last week in Euro 2008 qualifying.
[Side Note: Why was Gareth Barry wearing #7 and Beckham wearing #17 for England in that match?]
The good news for LA and MLS is that England failed to qualify for the Euro 2008 Championships, so they won't have to worry about Beckham getting called into the England squad for the tournament that will be held during the 2008 MLS regular season is in full swing.
US finds out it's potential opponent as they begin their march on the Road to the 2010 World Cup
The US will face the winner of Barbados and Dominica as they open up CONCACAF Qualifying for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
The U.S. also learned their three potential opponents in one of the three Semifinal Round groups, where they could face Guatemala, Trinidad & Tobago and Cuba should each country advance out of their early-round mini-groups.
RailHawks adding another USL 2nd Division player for 2008?
It appears that the Carolina RailHawks will be looking to the USL 2nd Division to add to their attack for the second time this offseason as they are rumored to be close to signing Matthew Watson away from the Richmond Kickers.
Watson had 6 goals and 3 assists for the Kickers in 2007 and was named the team's MVP.
The RailHawks are also set to add USL 2nd Division leading scorer Jacob Coggins from the Charlotte Eagles.
Add in USL 1st Division leading scorer Daniel Antoniuk whom the RailHawks have already signed and it's easy to see that Chris Economides and Scott Schweitzer have been working hard to upgrade one of the USL 1st Division's worst offensive attacks.
Post season awards gone wild
After reading these two articles, I'm left to wonder both "What's a key grip?" and "Outside of the winners and their friends and family, who cares who was named the MLS Operations Director of the Year (amongst all the other awards)?"
Seriously, it's nice to throw some of the behind the scenes people a carrot, but this is getting crazy, IMO.
What we're working on for Saturday's edition of Kick This!
We have pencilled in New Jersey Ironmen goalkeeper Tony Meola and US Women's National Team forward Abby Wambach to be guests on this week's show.
Tony will join us to talk about the Ironmen's home opener at the sparkling new Prudential Center as they host Nate Craft and the Detroit Ignition on Saturday night.
Abby will be on to talk about newly named USWNT head coach Pia Sundhage and what that means for the future of the USWNT program.
The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author, and not necessarily those of the Rochester Rhinos or SoccerSam.com. Feel free to send any comments or complaints to news@soccersam.com. James promises to read (but not to respond) to all of them.
