Daily news roundups

News roundup: Gold Cup, rankings, Steel at home, and crooked refs

Photo: Rob Simmons

Philadelphia

The Gold Cup is back, baby! Or, at least it will be in 2019, with Lincoln Financial Field chosen as one of 15 U.S. venues for next summer’s tournament.

Next year’s tournament will expand, allowing a record 16 CONCACAF members to participate. (The U.S. is, thankfully, automatically qualified.) Tournament matches will also be held in Central America and the Caribbean for the first time.

Seats remain for the USMNT match against Bolivia on Monday, May 28 at Talen Energy Stadium. There appears to be a ticket discount deal at the Union website, though I’m having a hard time opening the link myself.

Philadelphia Union

Over at Philly.com, Jonathan Tannenwald shares his thoughts on the Union’s match against Montreal.

Power rankings! MLSsoccer.com has the Union up to 18th (from 20 last week). ESPN has them at 15th, and  SoccerAmerica has them at 16th. Dallas SportsDay, by contrast, has the Union down at 21 (in the “dregs” category).

The Union website has a “Know Your Enemy” feature about Real Salt Lake, this week’s opponents. It’s a minor pet peeve of mine, but I think “enemy” is probably too strong a word to be throwing around willy-nilly about your soccer opponents. Reasonable minds may differ.

The Union have collected over 2,000 submissions in the search for the team’s new mascot.

Jim Curtin’s press conference will, as usual, be today at 12:30 p.m.

Bethlehem Steel

A rare midweek home match is on tap for the Steel this evening, as they host 2 New York 2 Red Bulls before the sun sets at Goodman Stadium. Kickoff is at 5 p.m.

Christian Sandler will be covering the match for PSP — look for his column on the Steel later today.

MLS

Gyasi Zardes earned MLS Player of the Week honors from the North American Soccer Reporters. Several members of the PSP staff are members of the organization, which votes on the award weekly.

Ben Olsen would like everyone to be happier about potentially signing Wayne Rooney. To be fair, I don’t know if things could be going worse for D.C. right now, so he may have a point.

World football

For the first time in over two decades, Arsenal Football Club is without a manager. The Guardian reports that former Gunners stalwart Mikel Arteta looks to be the frontrunner after two years apprenticing to Pep Guardiola at Manchester City.

Gunners legend Robert Pires, though, thinks NYCFC manager (and former teammate) Patrick Viera is ready for the job. Other reported names include Max Allegri and Carlo Ancelotti.

Joe Hart and Jack Wilshere look set to be surprising omissions from the England squad. Who will give up a ridiculous howler and get injured within 15 minutes for the Three Lions now?

Fox Sports is making the best of a World Cup without the United States. Here’s a video from Stu Holden and Rachel Bonetta where they pick new teams for the tournament. (This author is still accepting pitches about why I should root for your team.)

Let’s say you’re a referee on your way to the World Cup. What shouldn’t you do? Offer to fix the Saudi Arabian King’s Cup last weekend, earning yourself a lifetime ban from football. Someone really should have told 32-year-old referee Fahad al Midrasi sooner…

4 Comments

  1. Union injury report list Marquez and Yaro out. Sapong questionable.
    .
    Notable for two reasons:
    1) If Sapong can’t go then Simpson will get an opportunity
    2) Yaro is listed as having a concussion. Is this 3 for him now? Wishing him the best but starting to wonder if this is a recurring enough issue that warrants added protection.

    • Wow… if that’s really 3 concussions, I would start to wonder if this is enough of a recurrent issue to consider his exit from the sport.

  2. For the USMNT game the EPYSMAY28 discount seems pretty solid. It’s about a 20% savings across all tiks.
    .
    Only $20 to get an end seat.

    • el Pachyderm says:

      as a world cup warm up game the place would be packed to the gills even on Memorial Day…. such a shame the best player on the USMNT who just happened to grow up 90 minutes from Talen and has yet to feature in front of the home audience…needs to have the home MLS team stadium basically give away tickets to the event.
      .
      cynical cynical cynical.

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