Sevilla v Valladolid: Week 13

Kagawa is moving to La Liga in the winter window apparently. Would be a better backup for Mudo/Sarabia than Nolito has been.

2 Likes

How is football (soccer) doing in USA Chris, attendances increasing? Have you got a preferred team?

He was rumored for Sevilla in the summer. Could be a possibility. He’s getting close to that 30 number too.

Hi Tim, MLS is doing really well here in the US. It’s a bit weird with how the season works as they do a playoff, there are in season trades, and the season is from March to December so it’s different than the rest of the World. I’m a DC United Season Ticket holder so they are my team. DCU is a storied franchise with 4 MLS Cups, but it has been a while. We just got a new stadium and with that, the team brought in Wayne Rooney who has been really awesome. We draw about 20,000 fans per game.

The MLS playoffs are in the semi-final stage now with teams from Portland Oregon (Portland Timbers), Kansas City Missouri (Sporting Kansas City), Atlanta Georgia (Atlanta United) and New Jersey (New York Red Bulls) fighting it out. Atlanta is a new franchise and they are drawing huge crowds, 70,000 plus per game. They have a couple of players that will be playing in Europe soon.

As far as quality of play, it is getting better. MLS has been recruiting a lot of South and Central American players which has helped with the quality. Where you see a big difference is first touch and stringing together a bunch of passes.

2 Likes

Given the current market and usual slim pickings in the winter market. Iborra would be a rational choice, he has been injured quite a bit since joining the premier league but he should still be welcome here. He is also strong in the air, also he probably doesn’t have to play every game.

My dream signing would be Ignacho Camacho but I doubt we have the funds to convince Wolfsburg to let him go.

Thanks Chris, good to hear. When you realise that the USA is physically as big as Europe with a similar size population you realise the potential. I really hope it takes off in the USA, of course it will, the question is when.

70,000 in Atlanta Georgia sounds astronomic, big money, like a Barcelona home game.

Harkes played in Spain briefly despite making his name in Leeds.

I saw David Villa score a great goal a couple of months back, but I’ll keep an eye out for DC United now.

Maybe I’ll start an MLS thread just to keep you folks up to date if you care. There are some great athletic goals scored weekly. There are also some really great players that will be moving on to bigger and better things soon.

Atlanta and Seattle are an anomaly for sure in the MLS. Most towns/cities are happy with the 20k number.

I didn’t get to see Harkes play, I wasn’t a fan at that time and I was in school so not much time to pay attention anyway. His kid was on the United for a few years. He just isn’t the same quality at this time.

As far as where the US can go with football, I’m not sure. It’s the 4th/5th most popular professional sport domestically, but number one for youth. I think as less kids play American football (concussion research is killing the sport), football will start getting the top kids that would normally play AF. However, our structure of the USMNT is terrible right now. The leadership is horrible.

1 Like