While the Premier League overseas actually has an exciting title race for once, the best race of 2019 might be across the pond in Major League Soccer. We’re less than 10 games into the season, but the 2019 MLS Golden Boot race is shaping up to be something special.
Case in point: Wayne Rooney’s free kick against Columbus on Wednesday night.
When Garth Lagerway joined the Seattle Sounders in 2015 as the General Manager and President of Soccer, it wasn't just to get Seattle its first MLS Cup. The Sounders wanted to build an entirely revamped academy system — one able to develop talent for the MLS side, challenge at the youth level, gain pro experience at a USL affiliate (the Tacoma Defiance), and potentially be sold on to Europe.
The club's recent historic achievement in the Generation Adidas Cup was a major step in the evolution of the process.
According to Sky Sports and Sports Illustrated, the extremely hands-on managerial approach of Thierry Henry is about to be implemented at the New York Red Bulls.
This past week MLS announced that expansion was formally approved to hit 30 clubs over the coming years. In a country with a relatively young soccer community, interest continually growing, and a number of small to large sized untapped markets, expansion is a fundamental part of the soccer landscape. Not just for MLS but across all the leagues.
Here is a brief look at the new clubs set to debut in 2020. Expect this list to double by the time we reach November.
There have been many notable whiffs in the pantheon of U.S. soccer. This Cory Burke miss might be the worst.
Burke, a Philadelphia Union forward and Jamaica international, will never be as infamous as Major League Soccer’s most notorious whiffer, Chris Wondolowski. The San Jose striker may never live down his miss against Belgium at the 2014 World Cup and also has one of the most hilarious whiffs in MLS history from a few years ago.
The LA Galaxy handed the Houston Dynamo their first loss of the season on Friday night. Zlatan Ibrahimovic converted a penalty kick and Diego Polenta nodded home a late corner kick to give the home side a 2-1 victory at Dignity Health Sports Park.
The victory was a bit of revenge after the Dynamo knocked the Galaxy out of playoff contention on the last day of the regular season last year.
But Zlatan still wasn’t exactly all smiles after the match.
Major League Soccer held its annual Board of Governors meetings in Los Angeles this week. Along with allowing MLS clubs to collect solidarity payments in the future, one of the major outcomes of the meetings was the announcement that MLS expansion will increase the league to 30 teams in the near future.
MLS announces plans to expand to 30 teams in the coming years. More: https://t.co/P71gdJhogy pic.twitter.com/mlnLDNd7x1
It's been about a year since Zlatan Ibrahimovic debuted in MLS with two dramatic goals to help the LA Galaxy top new cross-town rivals LAFC. Despite the Galaxy's horrid defense, Zlatan kept the team in the playoff race for much of the campaign. He ended the season with 22 goals and 10 assists in just 27 matches. That was with avoiding turf and recovering from the injury he arrived in the U.S. with.
Things went from bad to worse last night for the New York Red Bulls when the club allowed victory to escape its grasp by virtue of an 88th-minute Sporting Kansas City equalizer at Children’s Mercy Park, leaving the Red Bulls — last season’s Supporters’ Shield winners — with only one win from its opening six games.
To compound matters, Alejandro Romero Gamarra, better known as Kaku, was given a straight red in the fourth minute of second half stoppage time for smashing the ball into the face of an SKC supporter from point-blank range.
Yesterday, I was one of the fortunate 19,796 to witness Minnesota United open Allianz Field in Saint Paul. Ultimately I was very blessed because I got to take part in a spectacular atmosphere, but more so because I got to watch NYCFC goalkeeper Sean Johnson finesse one into his own net.
The match took place at 4:00 p.m. with the temperature hovering around 40 degrees and the sun appearing about as frequently as a Minnesota clean sheet.