How do you even quantify the performances put in during the NY/LA game? That was a damn good weekend of soccer...hopefully I'll get a Premiership recap up on Center Holds It later today...
1. Juan Pablo Angel - if you watched Angel on Saturday you could see he was much more than goals; after various Galaxy attempts to break apart the Red Bull defense through restarts and scrappy midfield possession, Angel came back to counter their strategy; then in order to keep things flowing the Colombian pushed back into the midfield to dictate the pace and flow of the Red Bull offense; it was was extremely fitting that he got that no-angle game-winning goal in the waning moments as he was my man of the match
2. Jozy Altidore - I could have coupled these two at the top in order to put some more names on this list, but Altidore has scored 4 goals in the previous 2 games and he now sits with 7 goals (even after missing several due to the U-20 WC); Angel loves this kid, so does Beckham, and the talks of Jozy to Chelsea or Man Utd or anywhere have heated up; he could leave, he could stay for the time being but Jozy showed at the press conference that he has been appreciative of what the MLS has given him and knows that the Angel, Reyna, Mathis influence is good.....for now. (I will have quotes later tonight from the press conference)
3. David Beckham - his play against New York was passive as he let his artistic feet do the talking; this was all to preserve himself for the long haul and understandably so, but we clearly got a glimpse of 100% Beckham when he was taken out nastily by Dave Van den Bergh; Beckham sprung up and pointed a nasty finger at Dave VDB and then wrestled away from Joe Vide when he tried to calm Becks down
4. Carlos Pavon - after his performance in the Gold Cup many were expecting the Honduran to translate his success there into the MLS right away; but no, it's been somewhat of a waiting game and his strike in the SuperLiga win over D.C. United was the catalyst; him and Beckham seemed to be together on some kind of other level as they struck for both goals that put Los Angeles up 2-1 real early in Saturday's match
5. Jovan Kirovski - Kirovski's 2 goals was almost made three when he hit the post late in the game, but it was nice to see the former Bundesliga boy to strike yet again especially when Nico Hernandez has been quiet all season and Herc Gomez is taking a scoring vacation it seems; regardless, Kirovski put the chances away to demoralize the normally strong New England defense - soccer bloggers/journalists everywhere were asking, "Wha happen'd?"
6. Cuautehomac Blanco - Chicago loves the controversial veteran already and he applauds them with a beautiful cross breed between a rocket and a chip in to the top right corner of Nick Rimando's net; probably the goal of the week and the nonchalance with which he did it was even more impressive; let's not forget that Blanco was the one that delivered the corner kick that found Paolo Wanchope for his first goal in a Fire uniform - Blanco and Wanchope are doing what Beckham wants to (but then again, compare the opponents)
7. Luciano Emilio - Emilio gets bumped out of the top five by the other fantastic striker performances this past weekend, but Emilio's performance is no different - as he takes his opportunities and puts them away (unless it's the SuperLiga). His league leading 14 goals leads me to believe that he has replaced Twellman as the most opportunistic and best positioned striker in the league
8. Clint Mathis - he likes those big games and Cletus even gave us some funny sound-bytes after the game Beckham-centric press conference; his play was certainly somewhat indicative of his love for New York City and what he plans to do with this team this; Mathis is also making many people forget that Claudio Reyna is on the bench and injured yet again; his goal was vital in keeping Red Bull alive after a double salvo for Los Angeles near the end of the first half of that 5-4 thriller
9. Colin Clark - As nice as it was to see Maykel Galindo get back on his scoring horse against TFC, it was even nicer to see Colin Clark have the best game of his season. The Colorado native has really come on strong and looks poised to solidify a long-time starting position in the line-up; the young Clark should be joined by Joe Vide but there were too many crazy offensive performances to fit the two in here
10. US Nats - Donovan, Twellman, and Ching all had productive weekends, Donovan kept pulling the Galaxy back into the game versus the Red Bulls and for some reason he wasn't involved in the press conference afterwards, while Twellman and Ching provided the respective game-winning goals for their teams in 1-0 shutouts; their goals capped a great weekend of soccer in America - what you think?????
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