America hold a slender advantage heading into the second leg of their semifinal with Necaxa after scoring a vital away goal and earning a 1-1 draw.
However, if this match was anything to go by, the return leg in Mexico City will feature two evenly matched sides, and Necaxa will still believe that the final is within reach.
You’ve likely heard that Jose Mourinho’s Manchester United are, after 13 Premier League matches, further down the EPL table than they were during the dog days of David Moyes and Louis van Gaal. You’ve also probably been told that Mourinho has won as many games (six) in his last 20 EPL fixtures as Sean Dyche, Sam Allardyce and, yes, David Moyes. And all this after spunking a bajillion of the late Malcolm Glazer’s hard earned dollars all over the summer transfer market.
Following every weekend, when discussing Serie A, there's a temptation to focus on Juventus. As the long-time reigning champions, it's clear why the Turin side garners a huge amount of attention. But the best stories are not always found at the top of the table.
A new study from Deloitte, one of the “Big Four” accounting firms in the world by revenue, has offered up some pretty obvious conclusions with regards to implementing a system of promotion and relegation in the American soccer pyramid, but it’s also provided one of the more realistic takes on the possible benefits and risks involved.
This recent international break has proven, once again, why South America is the toughest qualifying process of any continent on the planet. On Thursday, Brazil trounced Argentina 3-0, Venezuela put up five on Bolivia and Peru handedly laid waste to Paraguay, 4-1. Then on the following Tuesday, Ecuador beat that same Venezuela team 3-0, that same Bolivia team beat Paraguay 1-0 and Argentina rebounded to shut Colombia out in a 3-0 win.
In a little over a year, the United States has witnessed some truly awful results under the leadership of Jurgen Klinsmann, but the back-to-back defeats to Jamaica and Panama to end a poor 2015 Gold Cup, defeat to Mexico at the 2015 CONCACAF Cup and historic 2-0 loss to Guatemala in the fourth round of World Cup qualifying all pale in comparison to Tuesday night’s capitulation in San Jose, Costa Rica.
The USA suffered their first home World Cup qualifying defeat since 2001 on Friday night, losing 2-1 to Mexico in Columbus for the opening game of the Hex.
Coach Jurgen Klinsmann made unexpected changes coming into the game. He sent out a 3-5-2 formation instead of the usual 4-4-2, causing some players to play out of their positions. The new formation had three center backs in defense with Matt Besler, John Brooks and Omar Gonzalez.
The Unofficial Football World Championships (UFWC) are a beautiful anomaly in the world’s game. While world and continental champions are officially determined by the corresponding, internationally sanctioned tournaments, what if the world champion was instead determined using a knock-out system like the one used in boxing? That’s exactly what the UFWC set out to do in 2003, spearheaded by freelance journalist and author Paul Brown.
Listening to Zinedine Zidane’s post-game press conferences after Real Madrid drop points is kind of like listening to a broken record. After Real’s 3-3 draw with Legia Warsaw in Poland, Zidane once again came out and used the same excuses to describe his team’s performance. There was a:
It’s almost as if Milan's young talent, 18year-old Manuel Locatelli and 17-year-old Donnarumma are constantly trying to one up each other.
In Milan’s stunning win over Juventus last week, Locatelli scored a goal of the season contender to put the Rossoneri in front and to deliver Milan a victory over Juventus for the first time since November of 2012.