USL Week in Review

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League News

USL named their First Division Team of the Week - Week #12:

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United Soccer Leagues announced the Team of the Week honors for the 12th week of the USL season.  Portland’s Mandjou Keita is the USL First Division Player of the Week. The Portland Timbers extended their franchise-record unbeaten streak to 12 games with a dominating 4-0 victory over the Montreal Impact at PGE Park powered, in part, by the two-goal performance from striker Mandjou Keita, earning Player of the Week honors for the second time. Keita also scored Portland’s lone goal in their US Open Cup match against the Seattle Sounders.

Pos Name Team Highlights

G Dusty Hudock Charleston Four saves in 1-0 win over Puerto Rico
D Nevio Pizzolitto Montreal Goal in 1-0 win over Miami
D Frankie Sanfilippo Charleston Led team in 1-0 win over Puerto Rico
D Cristian Arrieta Puerto Rico Led team in 2-1 win at Carolina
M Jeff Harwell Austin Goal in 2-2 draw at Cleveland
M Martin Nash Vancouver Goal, assist in 2-2 draw at Cleveland
M Mike Ambersley Rochester Goal in 2-1 win at Minnesota
M Jonathan Steele Puerto Rico Goal in 2-1 win at Carolina
F George Josten Portland Two assists in 4-0 win over Montreal
F Israel Sesay Cleveland Two assists in 2-2 draw against Austin
F Mandjou Keita Portland Two goals in 4-0 win over Montreal

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USL-1 Goal of the Week
Joshua Alcala of the Austin Aztex gets the USL Goal of the Week.

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US Open Cup News

Upsets plentiful in Open Cup last Tuesday
For the first time since 1997, two USL Second Division level clubs advanced to the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup Quarterfinals Tuesday evening as the Wilmington Hammerheads and Harrisburg City Islanders upset their MLS opposition to advance to the elite eight. Charleston also knocked off an MLS club for the third straight year and the Rochester Rhinos advanced in penalties.

3rd Round Results

Rochester Rhinos (USL-1) 1:1 Columbus Crew (MLS)
Rochester advance on PKs 5-3

Wilmington Hammerheads (USL-2) 1:0 Chicago Fire (MLS)

New England Revolution (MLS) 1:2 (aet) Harrisburg City Islanders (USL-2)

DC United (MLS) 2:0 Ocean City Barons (PDL)

Charleston Battery (USL-1) 3:1 Chivas USA (MLS)

Minnesota Thunder (USL-1) 3:3 Kansas City Wizards (MLS)
Kansas City advances on PKs 4-2

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Quarterfinal Games Played Tuesday, July 7

DC United (MLS) v. Harrisburg City Islanders (USL-2)
Maryland Soccerplex – Boyds, MD 7:30pm

Rochester Rhinos (USL-1) v. Wilmington Hammerheads (USL-2) USLLive.com
Marina Auto Stadium – Rochester, NY 7pm

Charleston Battery (USL-1) v. Houston Dynamo (MLS) USLLive.com
Blackbaud Stadium – Charleston, SC 7:30pm

Seattle Sounders (MLS) v. Kansas City Wizards (MLS)
Starfire Sports Complex – Tukwila, WA 10pm

US Open Cup Bracket

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Patriot-news.com tells us exactly what a $10,000.00 purse could mean to the small budget of the Harrisburg City Islanders. If they are the USL-2 team to advance the deepest in the US Open Cup, they would claim that $10,000. Harrisburg face off against DC United on Tuesday evening. Their competition is the Wilmington Hammerheads who will be facing off against the Rochester Rhinos. The Ocean City Barons have already claimed a ten grand prize for being the PDL team going the deepest in the tournament. The Rochester Rhinos and Charleston Battery are also competing to be the last USL-1 team left in the tournament.

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The Portland Timbers Offside Rules gives us some nice little snippets about last Wednesday’s Portland Timber v Seattle Sounders US Open cup match. This was truly a derby with both teams going all out for the win — truly a historic US Open Cup match. I love the conversation Bob Kellett has with the newbie Seattle fan concerning the face-kicker Roger Levesque. Great stuff Bob! He also gives links to game reports.

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Interview with Amos Magee
When Amos Magee returned to the National Sports Center in Blaine, MN last Saturday night, it was the first time ever not wearing some sort of a MN Thunder logo on his clothing. I talked to Magee about that as well as the successful year Portland is having. I also asked him about last week’s US Open Cup game against Seattle. Magee compared it to some of the European derbys he has been to and told us that he wasn’t the only one to think so. Go to IMS for the interview.

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Jeff Di Veronica says, MLS needs to take Cup more seriously. That’s something we’ve all been saying for a while now Devo and it’s frustrating as hell to see SuperLiga take precedent because there is more money to be had even though it’s now pretty much a meaningless tournament. I think it’s up to US Soccer to find a big sponsor for this tournament and publicize the heck out of it. It’s a great tournament but people need to know it exists and MLS needs to play it up.

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Pitched battle to marketing MLS in Portland and beyond: Rough and rowdy vs. family-friendly
Another very good article by Rachel Bachman, from the Oregonian. Former commissioner of MLS Doug Logan has some interesting things to say about what he thinks is the future of support to soccer in the US. He says rowdy over family.  I think there’s a place for both, but it’s definitely rowdy that will return week after week and support their team through thick and thin.

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Rachel Bachman turns right around and does a Q&A with Portland Timbers owner Merritt Paulson
Paulson weighs in with his thoughts on the same topic.  He says Logan was being flamboyant in his description. But he does agree with some of the things Logan is saying. “And the point that I agree with is a model that just targets soccer moms and youth soccer is an inherently flawed model. Those people spend their lives going to soccer games every weekend. Trying to target them for season tickets is the wrong way to go.” Thank you Merritt! I have been saying this very thing about the Minnesota Thunder for some time now and my words have sometimes fallen on deaf ears.

Why do I think this? Because I’ve talked to countless numbers of parents and youth coaches who tell me they have two or three kids playing soccer all year with 2 places to be at once and many times their weekends are full of soccer with tournaments. As I’ve heard numerous parents tell me, the last place I want to be on a weekend evening is another soccer game. And these are parents who love the game and subscribe to FSC. I don’t blame them, the pressures put on today’s  soccer moms and dads is at an all time high, both financially and time wise as well.

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Haiti and Impact Play to Scoreless Tie
The Montreal Impact and the Haitian National Team tied 0-0 last Wednesday, in front of 8,047 spectators at Saputo Stadium, in its second of six international games presented this summer in Montreal.

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Haitian Gold Cup Team Features 4 USL Players
It’s not the easiest to find, but if you dig into the Haitian National Teams roster you will find 4 USL Players. The most notable are Leonel Saint-Preux of the Minnesota Thunder and Fabrice Noel of the Puerto Rico Islanders. Kartik Krishnayier says both players had good games for Haiti but lost to Honduras despite dominating many parts of the game.

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RailHawks snap skid, squeak past Panama, 1-0
After a five-match winless streak followed a month-starting win on June 9, the RailHawks ended their weeks-long  skid – spread across a U.S. Open Cup and four USL-1 fixtures – on Tuesday night with a 1-0 win over the Panama National Team at WakeMed Soccer Park.

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The Carolina RailHawks have released goalkeeper Brian Levey, and he will go on a month-long tour with the Chicago Sockers. Levey will be with the Sockers during their tour of Sweden and Denmark. He departed on Friday and will return to the RailHawks on July 27.

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Forward Gregory Richardson is on trial with the Carolina RailHawks.
Richardson, a native of Guyana, previously played for the Trinidad & Tobago club Joe Public. Last September, he tallied a hat trick at Gillette Stadium in Joe Public’s 4-3 win over the New England Revolution during the group stage of the CONCACAF Champions League. Richardson was on trial with Toronto FC during its preseason, and he scored a goal against the U.S. U-20 side in a 2-1 TFC win. TFC held the rights to Richardson before trading them to Colorado in February. Richardson was waived by the Rapids last Friday. He appeared in two matches and played a total of 101 minutes in Colorado.

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ESPN Soccernet has their weekly review of the USL.

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RailHawks whip Wilmington, 3-0
The Carolina RailHawks won their second straight friendly on Friday, downing the Wilmington Hammerheads 3-0 before a crowd of 4,136 at WakeMed Soccer Park. Then they ask the question, Is the Slump Over?

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One day after taking on the Seattle Sounders of MLS and selling out the stadium, the Portland Timbers defeated German club Bayern Munich II 2-0 in an international exhibition match last Thursday before 9,340 at PGE Park. Forward Antouman Jallow scored his first goal of the season and rookie goalkeeper Brian Visser recorded the shutout.

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The Montreal Impact announced that more than 20,000 tickets had been sold for the Champions Trophy, three weeks from the historic matchup between the FC Girondins de Bordeaux, French Ligue 1 champions, and En avant de Guingamp, winner of the French Cup, to be held July 25, at Olympic Stadium.

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Passion Naranja is a web site that features the Puerto Rico Islanders.
An interesting point was made at Passion Naranja. Because Puerto Rico doesn’t represent a city or state, they have supporters everywhere they go. I’ve seen this myself all the way up here in Minnesota. As they state, “It’s a professional team with a national team feeling.” Well said!  Now there is a web site devoted to all those fans, The Islanders Foreign Legion. They just finished up a trip to Cary, North Carolina to see their team play the RailHawks and then traveled to Miami to see them take on Miami FC. Even my son who’s a Thunder fan has an Islander jersey that a friend brought back for him when traveling in Puerto Rico. I think with the success the team has had and their sort of neutral status, there are a lot of people who are now following the Islanders as their USL team of choice.

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William Smith from Big Apple Soccer talks to FC New York president, Doug Peterson, who continues to prepare for the United Soccer League First Division expansion team’s first season in 2010.

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RESULTS THIS PAST WEEK:

Friday, July 3, 2009

8:00 pm Austin Aztex  1-0  Cleveland City Stars @ Middlefield Cheese Stadium (Bedford) - Game Report – Box Scores
Scoring Summary:
AUS: Sullivan Silva 30
Attendance: 1837

Sat, July 4, 2009

8:00 pm Puerto Rico Islanders 0-0  Miami FC @ FIU Stadium - Game Report – Box Scores
Scoring Summary:
None
Attendance: Miami did not release an attendance number

8:05 pm Portland Timbers 1-1 Minnesota Thunder @ National Sport Center - Game Report – Box Scores
Scoring Summary:
Port: Tony McManus 63
MIN: Jeremiah Bass 90+
Attendance: 3647

Sunday, July 5, 2009

3:00 pm Austin Aztex  1-4  Rochester Rhinos @ Rochester Rhinos Stadium - Game Report – Box Scores
Scoring Summary:
ROC: Johnny Menyongar 51
ROC: Warren Ukah (Danny Earls) 59
ROC: Nano Short (Tiger Fitzpatrick) 66
ROC: Ryan Heins (John Ball) 72
AUS: Eddie Johnson 84
Attendance: 6892

3:45 pm Charleston Battery  1-0  Montreal Impact @ Saputo Stadium - Game Report – Box Scores
Scoring Summary:
CHA: Dan Antoniuk (Scott Buete) 68
Attendance: 11581

IIMS~IMS~IMS~IMS~IMS

GAMES THIS COMING WEEK:

Games times are listed EST. Games all available on USL Live except Friday night game available on Fox Soccer Channel.

Thursday, July 9, 2009

10:30 pm Minnesota Thunder at Vancouver Whitecaps @ Swangard Stadium

Friday, July 10, 2009
(Fox Soccer Channel)

8:00 pm Puerto Rico Islanders at Rochester Rhinos @ Marnia Auto Stadium

Saturday, July 11, 2009

7:30 pm Carolina RailHawks at Charleston Battery @ Blackbaud Stadium

8:05 pm Montreal Impact at Minnesota Thunder @ National Sport Center

8:30 pm Portland Timbers at Austin Aztex @ Nelson Field

Sunday, July 12, 2009

5:00 pm Puerto Rico Islanders at Cleveland City Stars @ Middlefield Cheese Stadium

6:00 pm Vancouver Whitecaps at Miami FC @ FIU Stadium

USL-1 Standings

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