1. Maykel Galindo - his performance this past weekend might not have been as impressive but the Cuban striker keeps finding the back of the net, even when the seemingly sure-fire Juan Pablo Angel has cooled down a bit; Galindo’s Kenny Cooper-esque goal (remember that chip from the same corner of the 18 last year) sealed the 2-0 rebound win over New England
2. Nicolas Addlery - the D.C. United forward came out of “obscurity” and was signed not more than a month ago after the Virginia Beach Mariners disbanded; between Nicolas and Guy-Roland Kpene, they have injected youth into a tiring and aging United line-up; his selection as MLS Player of the Week keeps DC atop the awards stand as they have 3 of those last 4 honors; an injury to Kpene will see Addlery continue to get his time up top with Luciano Emilio
3. FC Dallas Defense - you can make the argument that Houston, Columbus, Chicago, Colorado, and Chivas USA all forced shutouts, but the Hoops backline dealt with a boatload of adversity; it was Bobby Rhine, Aaron Pitchkolan, Clarence Goodson, and David Wagenfuhr that managed to shut down DeRo and the Houston offense; Wagenfuhr also jumpstarted the offense at times with some outside runs as the Hoops also managed to outshoot one of the hottest teams in the league
4. Kei Kamara - struggling all year to find the net, Kamara found it when most needed this past Saturday against the Red Bulls; RBNY’s newly configured defense was effective but let down for Kamara in the 69th minute allowing the Crew to seal their third consecutive victory as their rise in the standings tries to match pace of DC United; the Bulls managed a measly shot on goal while Columbus wasn’t much better but Andy Herron’s cross found Kamara for the nod home
5. Sam Reynolds - an “emergency” GK signing has scored himself some points with Mo and Gansler; his first half was shaky but Reynolds came through when it was sorely needed, making five decent saves to preserve the away tie with Kansas City - Reynolds and Djekanovic. Why not save some cap room and get rid of Greg Sutton? Despite Reynolds' decent game, just like Djekanovic he is raw and somewhat shaky. He got away with some iffy play at times. What were your thoughts on Collin Samuel's debut?
6. Michael Harrington - in the most entertaining game of the weekend, Harrington is third fro m the Toronto/Kansas City match-up; he has become the favorite for rookie of the year and is a real threat on the outside; even more impressive was that he originally played fullback at UNC and, recognizing his talent, he was asked to mold to outside midfield in order to fit the rookie into the KCW line-up
7. Chad Marshall - a fantastic defensive performance against Juan Pablo Angel as he altogether kept Angel, for the first time, off the Top 10 Brightest Spots of the Week; Marshall has been laboring with injury problems and consistency issues after first taking the league by storm earlier in his career; slowly he is making his way back onto the USMNT radar and a performance like this will surely help; as soon as his durability returns look for the US to have yet another central back they can depend on
8. Fred - the DC attacking midfielder has slowly started to find his groove and his MLS scoring account was opened this week after finishing a Nicolas Addlery ball in Thursday nite’s drubbing of Colorado; it’s going to take a little longer and he might not score as often as he did with the Melbourne Victory but he is ready to work his way into that Latin Trifecta even if he’s got to make room for himself
9. Danny Dichio - he doesn’t create much, but when given a decent cross there is almost no one I would rather have in the six battling with the defenders; once I saw Dichio in the vicinity of that cross from Ronnie O’Brien (wish Dichio and Drew Moor were on the same team then maybe he would have finished that sitter, even if it was slow lob of a cross)
10. MLSNet.com’s new look - the verdict is still out on the new website, but it does manage to put a crapload of information on one page and as a stat-lover and as a person who yearns for omnipotence in the world of soccer, the MLS webmasters of done well.
Because I Think...’s Worst (but not really...) of the Week: It’s not MLS, but most of the players on the US Men’s National Team are from the MLS and that performance against Paraguay was one of the most entertaining, frightening, promising, and unbelievably frustrating things I have ever seen; Rico Clark was wonderful, Benny Feilhaber was great until he lost his cool with 20 minutes to go, Benny Olsen fought his ass off yet again but little mistakes and big misses kept the US stale; Feilhaber’s through-ball was a thing of beauty, Justin Mapp’s mazy run through three Paraguayan defenders was just as good and with finishes it all would have been world class football...instead, we saw Eddie Johnson push a near post header wide, Justin Mapp opt out of a through ball to EJ and a far post chip hit the cross bar, Drew Moor missed a wide open header by putting it right into the keeper’s arms (he was almost TOO open), and errant crosses wasted precious chances. Let us not forget the gift-pass from Jimmy Conrad, whose game beside that was rather efficient. In all honesty, though, Bradley has come to Venezuela to test his young’uns. What do we know so far?
Drew Moor can play. His crossing adequate. His tackling adequate. His defensive presence adequate. Let him compete for that right-back spot.
Demerit and Conrad still work well in the middle and could potentially keep Onyewu and Bocanegra honest. Let us forget that Conrad backpass ever happened.
Benny Feilhaber, Ricardo Clark, and Michael Bradley is your midfield of the future folks. Bradley showed it in the Gold Cup and Clark and Benny have shown it in Venezuela. Kljestan was functional. Put Justin Mapp on the wing and improve his decision making and you have a decent midfield people.
Jonathan Bornstein is his own worst enemy, but when on point, he can play with some of the best players in the Western Hemisphere. We have yet to see him against an England, France, or Portugal.
Brad Guzan deserves a chance in goal before this tourney is through.
What are your thoughts?
Paraguay 3, United States 1
Copa America
Goalscorers
PAR: Edgar Barreto, Roque Santa Cruz, Salvador Cabanas
USA: Ricardo Clark
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