As I was watching the Chicago Fire tear apart a terrible New York side, I thought 'I can't wait until Chicago plays at the Galaxy.'
Turns out, I don't need to get ahead of myself. Instead of Cuauhtemoc Blanco versus Becks and Landon, it's going to be Cuauhtemoc Blanco versus Chris Klein and Edson Buddle. Chicago plays at LA on Aug. 21. On Aug. 20, the U.S. will play its first of six semifinal World Cup qualifying matches, if the U.S. gets past Barbados. The same day, England will play the Czech Republic. And at the rate we're going, Blanco may somehow earn a spot back on Mexico.
Suddenly, I can wait.
9 comments:
To be fair, Edson Buddle has shown signs of life lately. Goals aside, he's actually running at people with some confidence. He just needs to tighten up his form and he might actually start to harness his talent.
PESCADITO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Man, I wish MLS would do something about this scheduling. I don't care how good Edson Buddle is playing or that Ruiz will play - the game needs Blanco vs. Beckham/Donovan for the entertainment value. Bummer.
Does Guatemala have a WC qualifier around the same time (I haven't checked any of the dates), if so Ruiz will be gone as well, right? if not it'll be nice to have him upfront for sure alongside Buddle. Hopefully the younger guys are learning from Donovan/Beckhmam runs
All of CONCACAF will play on Aug 20 so Guatemala will be in action unless they lose to St. Lucia.
In terms of the game, it doesn't matter how good Buddle or Klein or Cronin or anyone else is playing. Doesn't matter if Buddle has 20 goals by then, the game will not be the same without Becks and Donovan. Period. The thing that irks me is that MLS could have scheduled the game for Aug. 23, a Saturday, two days later, and Beckham and Donovan could have been available.
Completely ridiculous, especially when you consider MLS knew of this international fixture date BEFORE the schedule came out. And dont feed me this bullshit about stadium availability because Chivas is playing on Aug 23 at home. They could have swapped games if they wanted to or moved Chivas to Sunday or something but instead we'll have a game lacking starpower to showcase to a national television audience.
Great way to ruin a marquee matchup.
Hey LB thats my complaint as well. When they want a friendly against a Euro team they move things around. When they wanted Superliga they moved games around. We have to many soccer stadiums to even justify that excuse any more! With Philly building a home, NY getting their's in 09 and RSL getting their place later this year,this will finally be exposed for the bull shit that it is.
Seriously.
I mean, if you ask me, Galaxy-Chicago is one of the five best matchups in the league and they go and find a way to fuck that up.
The one thing I would have said before making the schedule is "How can we ensure that Blanco, Beckham and Donovan play in both Galaxy-Fire games?"
How difficult would that have been?
When does Chicago play at Chivas USA then? I was very impressed with Chicago yesterday against NY and would like to see them play in person.
Chicago plays here on June 19 against Chivas USA.
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