Category: San Francisco Soccer

Vicente Sanchez has not been playing for Colorado Rapids in the last two months. During this period, the club has missed his creative presence in the team. This has led to them dropping several points over the last few matches. After coming on the back of a run of two matches without a win, they finally managed a 2-0 victory over Vancouver Whitecaps and this was inspired by Sanchez’ return to the team. The 34-year-old played only 69 minutes in the match, but it was enough to see Colorado get the three points and stay in touch with Seattle Sounders at the top of the table.

After the match, manager Pablo Mastroeni admitted that the team could have done with the presence of Sanchez in the last two months. Even though he is an advocate of team spirit and team performance, he said that Sanchez is the type of player who can bring magic on the field. The player himself admitted that he was certainly not 100% fit, but he was happy to clock in the minutes ahead of a crucial run-in. Rapids midfielder Darren Powers also spoke about the return of Sanchez by saying that the 34-year-old brings a lot of confidence to the rest of the team.

Colorado have had the last four matches at home and they will be continuing against Columbus Crew in the next match at home as well. “I’m happy. I don’t have any pain in my leg and the team collected three important points against Vancouver,” said Sanchez. “He could’ve [gone 90 minutes]. More importantly, for him, to finish the game in the form that he did, which was really good, and now to build on that next week,” said the manager about his star asset. “[Vicente] brings a lot of confidence for everyone else around him. It brings the whole team up,” said Powers.

LA Galaxy manager Bruce Arena says that he expects Brazil to win the World Cup 2014, but competition will be intense. Arena takes a break from MLS football in order to focus on the World Cup and that have been various avenues through which he has been giving this expert opinions. The United States will be playing in a tough group that involves teams like Germany, Portugal, and Ghana. However, Jurgen Klinsmann’s team have the advantage of having been in training for couple of weeks more than their opponents.

Further, the MLS league is also midway through the campaign, which means that the players are likely to be fit than the energy sapped counterparts from Europe. Arena does not think this will be an advantage for USA since he believes that the group will be tightly contested. Many people have been predicting that Spain and Brazil will be the favourites to win the title. Spain come into the tournament after having lifted the last three major titles, while Brazil have home support behind them. Arena thinks that the home support will eventually have its say and that Luiz Felipe Scolari’s men will be able to win the tournament.

If Arena’s predictions come true, it would be Brazil’s first World Cup victory since 2002. It will also be their sixth title overall. “The final standings in group play will determine the matchups right through to the finals on July 13. We could see Brazil, Argentina, Germany and Spain advancing to the semifinals, which would be an incredible climax to what could be the best World Cup of all time. In the end, I believe Brazil will prevail. Enjoy the World Cup!” said Arena. After having made a poor start to the MLS season, LA Galaxy are currently seventh in the table with just 17 points on board.

Philadelphia Union defender Austin Berry has never really been threatened for a first-team place in the last few years. He has been a regular player at his previous clubs like Chicago Fire as well. However, a combination of injury problems and poor form has led to the player into suffering a long time of being in the bench. He was especially guilty of making some mistakes against big teams like LA Galaxy, which have allowed the likes of Robbie Keane to score. Despite such problems, Berry has revealed that he is ready to show the Philadelphia Union manager that he deserves to be in the starting line-up on a regular basis.

Berry has revealed that he became a little too comfortable for his own liking when he was at Chicago Fire. Now, the increased competition for places mean that he is no longer a few matches away from being dropped if he puts in poor performances. The 25-year-old starter this season with a couple of hamstring injuries, which prevented him from making the first three matches of the season. Since then, he has been kept out of the first-team by Aaron Wheeler. This was because of the very poor performance against Real Salt Lake back in April.

“It’s definitely been a challenge. But I think, personally, it’s made me a little better. In Chicago, I think maybe I was a little bit too comfortable because there really wasn’t anyone pushing for my spot. Here, I really had to earn that spot back. That in itself made me work a little bit harder, put some more time in and kind of get myself back,” said the player about fighting back for a first-team spot. Philadelphia Union manager John Hackworth is someone should have a lot of options in this position but he says that Berry can win back his place.