Soccer Buzz

Okay, an overly busy weekend combined with little to no Internet access kind of threw me off.  Well, let’s look at what’s been happening.

• A nice 2-0 win for the MLS All-Stars over Celtic in the All-Star Game Thursday night.  Yes, I know it was a friendly, but I enjoyed it anyway.

• Beckham made his “debut” for the LA Galaxy in a 1-0 defeat to Chelsea, coming on as a substitute in the 78th minute.  There were questions as to if he would play at all, but I suppose the ankle was good enough to play for twelve minutes.  However, I think we all got our fix of Becks with the Beckham cam following his every move on the bench as well as warming up for his cameo appearance.  If this type of coverage annoys you, I suppose we will just need to get used to it because I doubt it will change for the rest of this season regardless of his fitness.

• Cuauhtemoc Blanco made his debut for the Chicago Fire in a 1-1 draw against Celtic, scoring a goal and helping Chicago actually look like a talented team for the first time this season.  Blanco will probably look even better when/if Chris Rolfe returns from injury.  The question still remains as to which Blanco will show up every game (the brilliant one, or the lazy one).

• An interesting Sunday of MLS fixtures.  Houston and New England put on an entertaining 3-3 draw with a couple of fantastic goals from Pat Noonan and Dwayne De Rosario.  Guillermo Barros Schelotto continued his fine play with the Crew with both goals in a 2-0 win over Toronto.  New York managed to scrape by DC United with a 1-0 win at home despite the absence of a suspended Juan Pablo Angel.  Finally, KC could only get a draw from Colorado in a 2-2 game marred by Colorado’s incessant, hacking tactics, the Wizards overreacting to these tactics, and putrid officiating by Tim Weyland, who allowed Colorado to get away with these tactics despite 8 yellow cards and 1 red card.  Eddie Johnson continued his tremendous season with his 11th and 12th goals of the year (in only 11 games played).  And Mehdi Ballouchy should be expecting a fine and a suspension for elbowing Sasha Victorine before the half (Weyland only booked Ballouchy for the incident).

• Can the Carlos Tevez transfer saga get any stranger?  FIFA was called in to settle the dispute between West Ham and Manchester United, but FIFA has now decided to send the case to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.  For those of you that have lost track of what exactly is going on, West Ham won’t allow Tevez to move to West Ham because of confusion over who owns the player’s economic rights.  Tevez’s agent Kia Joorabchian claims that he would be entitled to any transfer fee, but West Ham and the Premier League claim that any fee must go to the club.  I’m sure Tevez will end up at Manchester United, but this can’t be good news for the Red Devils as they will have to wait even longer to incorporate him into the team.

• Superliga, the new competition between American and Mexican clubs, begins this evening with FC Dallas hosting Chivas de Guadalajara and the Galaxy hosting Pachuca.  The big story (not surprisingly) is that Beckham is listed as doubtful for this evening’s game as the left ankle is still acting up.  Personally, I hope they give him the night off and try to get him ready for Saturday’s game against Chivas de Guadalajara.