Zlatan Ibrahimovic did not play in the MLS All-Star Game last week. As a consequence, Major League Soccer suspended its biggest star for the LA Galaxy’s 2-1 loss to the lowly Colorado Rapids on Saturday.
Of course, Zlatan could not stay quiet about this suspension. Speaking with reporters on Thursday, the hulking Swede said “no comment” while also making quite a comment.
For the price of $5 per month or $50 per year, ESPN+ was already a no-brainer for those who watch MLS, the USL, the UEFA Nations League and lower league English football. However, the broadcast package has significantly upped its offerings with this bit of news: ESPN+ will now stream 340 Italian Serie A matches over the course of the season as part of an exclusive, multi-year agreement in the United States.
At the age of 19, Alex Hunter’s career is already approaching that of the journeyman. Back in FIFA 17, you selected a Premier League club to start with, but you were then loaned to a Championship side before returning to the EPL.
In FIFA 18, you started with your parent club before being offloaded to the Los Angeles Galaxy because of Michael the conniving agent. After grinding in MLS, you then signed with either Atletico Madrid, PSG or Bayern Munich.
There was something vaguely familiar about yesterday’s Orlando Pride vs. Sky Blue match up: a handball clearance off the line in crunch time, a red card, a penalty, a penalty save. All right, it’s not exactly a World Cup knockout game and Carli Lloyd didn’t know much about the goal-saving move (it seems), but one can’t help but think of a certain Uruguayan striker by the name of Luis Suarez after seeing this.
Carli Lloyd's red card pic.twitter.com/iOnZwEiY0d
Bastian Schweinsteiger scored the seventh goal of his MLS career last night (his fourth of the 2018 season), and it was undoubtedly the best strike of his Chicago Fire tenure. Chicago was trailing 1-0 in the 48th minute after Damir Kreilach had given Real Salt Lake the advantage, but Schweinsteiger quieted the 19,817 inside Rio Tinto Stadium with this sensational long-range bomb.
Many in the U.S. would suggest 22-year-old American midfielder Lynden Gooch should leave Sunderland, a club for which he’s appeared in the Premier League, Championship and, as of Saturday, League One, all in a three-year span. In terms of the California native’s development, they might be right. But the Lynden Gooch goal vs Charlton Athletic on Saturday showed why the Black Cats would prefer to keep him, even if the play started out poorly for Gooch.
It’s been nearly 10 months since Bruce Arena resigned in disgrace as USMNT coach after failing to guide the Americans to the World Cup for the first time since 1986. The U.S. still hasn’t named a replacement.
Down a goal in the first half, the U.S. women’s national team came back and then some on its way to winning the Tournament of Nations on Thursday night in Chicago. The team went undefeated and put away nine goals in the three-game series, lifting its first ToN trophy and continuing to build its case as 2019 World Cup favorite with a 4-1 win for the USWNT vs Brazil.
FIFA 19 is just eight weeks from being released (Sept. 28), and the hype is starting to build. EA Sports managed to win the licence for the Champions League and Europa League over from the folks at Konami and PES, so already FIFA 19 has a point on the board over its rivals.
But, if rumors are to be believed, that’s not all that will be different about FIFA 19 this year.
All-star games should be about having fun, lackadaisical defense and offensive firepower. At least the MLS All-Star Game got one of those right on a record-breaking Wednesday night in Atlanta.
ESPN gave starting MLS All-Star goalkeeper Brad Guzan a mic and earpiece, allowing him to speak with the TV commentators in the middle of the match against Juventus.
It was stupid, gimmicky, dumb — and we absolutely loved it.
We weren’t the only ones who loved it.