On Wednesday, May 22, Seattle Sounders and USMNT centerback Chad Marshall announced his retirement.
While he never quite broke into the USMNT first team with only 12 appearances, Marshall will go down as one of the best American centerbacks to ever play the game.
It’s raining sideways in Herzogenaurach on Monday evening with the temperature hovering in the low 40s. With a colossal match against Augsburg — one place above Schalke in the desperate battle to avoid the Bundesliga relegation playoff — looming the following Sunday, you could forgive Weston McKennie for being in a foul mood after traveling over 400 kilometers from Gelsenkirchen to arrive at adidas headquarters in Herzo for an evening of interviews.
Dusan Tadic is having the season of his life in Amsterdam.
The Serbian international has been quite a revelation for Ajax, a team that is two games away from claiming the Eredivisie title and two matches away from the Champions League final. Tadic is more than partly responsible for the upturn in form for the Dutch giants, scoring a whopping 30 goals and assisting 20 in all competitions this season.
Even though the EFL Championship is not easy to find on American television spare ESPN+, soccer fans will have at least heard about Norwich City, Leeds United and Sheffield United’s push for the top two promotion spots. Usually, the teams and players at the top of the Championship get a lot of the rare press and rightly so, but there is one hidden gem not in the top six in England’s second division that could soon light up the Premier League: Jarrod Bowen.
Uruguay thumped Thailand 4-0 Monday to capture the 2019 China Cup, but the real story of the match was captain Diego Godín collecting his 126th cap for la Celeste, making him the record holder in that department for the two-time world champions.
When Denmark convenes for a friendly against Kosovo (March 21) and a massive Euro 2020 qualifier against Switzerland in Basel (March 26), it’ll do so without an attacker that many are desperate to finally see at the senior level — 22-year-old FC Copenhagen winger Robert Skov.
It was a great weekend for teenage homegrown players in Major League Soccer as two academy products — Toronto FC’s Ayo Akinola and the Philadelphia Union’s Brenden Aaronson — marked their first starts with goals.
Akinola is a 19-year-old who’s recently been called-up for the U.S. pre-U-20 World Cup training camp in Spain. The Detroit-born forward appeared in four matches as a substitute for Toronto last year, totaling only 45 minutes.
However, on Sunday he was given his first start, went 85 minutes in the 3-2 win over New England and scored his first goal.
Chances are, you’re somewhat familiar with the Marcus Rashford story. It’s well known that he’s a local lad, having joined the Manchester United academy system at the age of seven.
His astronomical rise at the club is also well documented. He made his first team debut for United at the age of 18 while the side was stalling under the leadership of Louis van Gaal. However, in the space of a few days, a star was born.