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Search: ' Landon Donovan'

Stories

Life after David

wsc299 Ian Plenderleith asks: How will football in America move forward without the newly crowned MLS Cup-winner David Beckham?

Major League Soccer has learned one major lesson from the big leagues in Europe it aspires to eventually compete with, and that is the ability to blow its own trumpet. Crowds are up! Sponsorship and TV revenues are up! New stadiums are being built! We are expanding the number of teams every season! Big name players are coming from abroad!

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Losing the legacy

Ian Plenderleith approves of the attempts to throw off the shackles of British footballing attitudes in North America

A panel of US football journalists arrived at the national coaching convention in Baltimore at the start of this year for a general discussion about media coverage in the States. In the time allowed, however, there was only one topic that interested the few dozen present – the importation of British television commentators, and how it reflects on the state of the US game.

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Blast from the past

Gavin Willacy tells the turbulent tale of USA team the San Jose Earthquakes, the club that refuses to go away

While British media coverage of the MLS play-offs started and ended with David Beckham and LA Galaxy’s exit at the penultimate stage to Dallas, a more interesting story was ignored in the other semi-final. San Jose Earthquakes came from mid-table to within one win of the MLS Cup final, losing 1-0 to Colorado in only their third season since returning to the league. The Earthquakes – football’s ultimate boomerang club – are back, again.

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Slim pickings

Despite a respectable performance in South Africa some think the US could have achieved more. Ian Plenderleith explains why

When US coach Bob Bradley substituted Ricardo Clark 30 minutes into the team’s final World Cup game against Ghana, he whispered intensively into the player’s ear for several seconds before packing him off to the bench. As Clark’s sole contributions in his half hour had been to lose possession in the lead up to Ghana’s opening goal, and to receive a yellow card for an amateurish late tackle, there was much lively speculation about the words Bradley had directed towards the central midfielder.

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World Cup 2010 TV diary – Group stages

Relive four weeks of statements of the obvious from the pundits, daily complaints about the wobbly ball and over-emphatic pronunciations of Brazilian names

June 11
South Africa 1 Mexico 1
“It’s in Africa where humanity began and it is to Africa humanity now returns,” says Peter Drury who you feel would be available for film trailer voiceover work when it’s quieter next summer. Mexico dominate and have a goal disallowed when the flapping Itumeleng Khune inadvertently plays Carlos Vela offside. ITV establish that it was the right decision: “Where’s that linesman from, that football hotbed Uzbekistan?” asks Gareth Southgate who had previously seemed like a nice man. "What a moment in the history of sport… A goal for all Africa,” says Drury after Siphiwe Tshabalala crashes in the opener. We cut to Tshbalala’s home township – “they’ve only just got electricity” – where the game is being watched on a big screen which Jim Beglin thinks is a sheet. Cuauhtémoc Blanco looks about as athletic as a crab but nonetheless has a role in Mexico’s goal, his badly mishit pass being crossed for Rafael Márquez to score thanks to a woeful lack of marking. The hosts nearly get an undeserved winner a minute from time when Katlego Mphela hits the post. Óscar Pérez is described as “a personality goalkeeper” as if that is a tactical term like an attacking midfielder. Drury says “Bafana Bafana” so often it’s like he’s doing a Red Nose event where he earns a pound for an irrigation scheme in the Sudan every time he manages to fit it in.

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