I can't seem to find anything on what's going on with Leslie Osborne and FC Gold Pride now that she is a free agent. Has anyone heard anything?
That would not surprise me at all, given the Santa Clara contingent with CSR and the Peter Whit and Leslie family connections in Milwaukee. Will be sad to see her go from FCGP if it happens, but would be a great move for CSR.
You can almost say that the chicago Red Stars are Santa Clara east. Not only are the three who are playing for the CRS but also Danielle Slaton is at Northwestern and Erin Chastain who is married to Brandi's brother is head coach at Depaul.
Rumors that Carli Lloyd is headed from CRS to SkyBlue today. That certainly leaves room for CRS to get Leslie on the roster.
If Osborne was healthy she would be going to Germany and we could sure use her. I have fond memories of her shutting down Victoria Svensson of Sweden and Kelly Smith of England during the 2007 WWC. Boxx and Leslie make a great pair.
Looks like Andy Crossley just answered our question on the Boston thread, Leslie has signed with the Breakers, joining Weimer as the FCGP free agents head back to the east coast. All the best to Leslie.
They aren't even getting one step forward. So far it has all been steps backward. I don't see where this team is going. There doesn't seem to be any direction. I'll miss Osborne and the Breakers sure are loading up. I think I'll become a Breakers fan. FCGP has nothing right now to make me want next season to start unless, of course, they plan to bring Mia back for a reunion with Brandi and Tiff. Re-sign Sissi and we could have a oldtimers game every week with a new national team member from the World Cup signing on each week until we have that whole team. Looking forward to an exciting 2010!!! Are you with us??? Yikes!!! As you can tell, I'm a little upset about the fact that Osborne is leaving.
From the WPS website: http://www.womensprosoccer.com/Home/boston/news/general/091021-Osborne-agrees-to-terms.aspx What stood out some is her comment about Puma being in the same city. This tells me that other things may have weighed in on her signing with the Breakers. She may be thinking about promotions, commercials, other opportunities, as well. She's a pro athlete and there is nothing wrong with that.
I believe Leslie has a contract with Puma already and is giving them a good mention in the interview.
Sounds like she wanted to play for a professional organization - one with a professional coach, a professional owner and a professional approach to the upcoming season. Can't blame her, but am very sad to see her leave. What does it say when a team loses its captain, and one of its top draft pick after the first year? When talent takes off there are usually good reasons.
There were matches in 2009 where Osborne was not into the game. She played horribly. It was interesting that Weimer was benched and Osborne flaky. I think there were internal issues with the players and coaches. Hopefully this season we will have a happier group of players who play with heart and with the quality they did the first few games of 2009. We'll see soon but not soon enough! Should be interesting at Hayward and beautiful for night games!
This thread is laughable. This team has gone from last to first in the projections for 2010. Not just because of the addition of Marta. But because of all their additions. No other team in the historic history of the WPS (LOL) has had this kind of offensive firepower on one team: Marta, Christine Sinclair, Kelley O'hara, Camille Abily, Solveig Gulbrandsen, Tiffeny Milbrett, Kiki Bosio (flip-thrower), Kandace Wilson can play anywhere on the field almost. The defensive firepower has strong potential (but isn't proven just yet) with: Candance Chapman, Kandace Wilson, Carrie Dew, Rachel Buehler, Ali Riley and company, plus Nicole Barnhart as the goalkeeper (Top 4 in the WPS). Add more valuable youth and veterans at midfield and defense off the bench in: Kristen Graczyk, Brandi Chastain, Becky Edwards, Niki Cross, Kaley Fountain, etc. (if all those players make the roster), and you have a heck of a team in Quality and Quantity of talent/depth across the board. It makes the losses of: Tiffany Weimer and Eriko Arikawa look like nothing (who would these two play in front of on this team at forward now). It also makes the losses of Marissa Abegg, Adriane, Erika, Sissi, Greer Barnes, Tina DiMartino, Lindsay Massengale, and Leigh Ann Robinson look like nothing as well. Only midfielders Leslie Osborne and Formiga were losses that would have been guaranteed (or near guarantee) to make this roster over the talent on the roster they have now in the midfield. All their other losses from last year have been replaced by equal or greater talented players. Marta = 4-time Fifa World P.O.Y. (first woman ever there), and she's Brazil's #1 player Christine Sinclair = Canada's #1 player Camille Abily = France's #1 player Solvieg Gulbrandsen = Norway's #1 player Kelly O'hara = Hermann trophy winner (top player in college in 2009) Nicole Barnhart = Top 4 goalkeeper in WPS Rachel Buehler = one of the Top 5 defenders in WPS. Carrie Dew = one of the best young defenders in WPS. Good looking blonde (if that means anything). Ali Riley = one of the best rookie defenders you could ever ask for. Kandace Wilson = phenomenal player if she can stay healthy and put it all together. as much upside potential as any other non-superstar player in the league.
The thread isn't laughable, it was justified based on the actions of the team last year and immediately following the season. In fact, it was threads like this, from dedicated fans, that showed management the outrage in the local soccer community. It was threads like this that got the team's GM to respond directly to the fans and start communicating with them... something that was never done last year. No, this is not a laughable thread, but in fact should be seen as the start of things that turned around the team; fan outrage.
That's true because we know that FCGP will be very good this year barring an attack of the bird flu or something totallly unforseen. But what IS relevant is who's the hottest player on the team now that Osborne is gone?
Fan involvement is good but let's not take ourselves, and BS (convenient acronym), too seriously. GP took the BS fans so seriously, they let Tiffany Weimer go as a free agent. The "turnaround", at least with the roster, has nothing to do with fan outrage and a lot more to do with a deep draft, the folding of the Sol, and just plain luck. GP added some good promising players thanks to a deep draft. They added impact players thanks to the demise of the Sol. They were lucky enough to have Marta fall to them and the 3rd pick in the dispersal draft. They made a good trade thanks to the shortsightedness of another team, getting two high draft picks from Atlanta for your backup GK Allison Whitworth (good GK but one game doesn't make you a proven GK; in this draft Atlanta could've gotten a college GK like Naeher or Ashlyn Harris as promising as Whitworth minus the one game) You still have an unproven defensive unit and you're counting on one or two rookies to make an impact - Riley or Fountain. I see no depth in the midfield, although it may not be as bad as it looks at first glance since you're probably going to play a 4-3-3. But Becky Edwards really may be key here because otherwise there's quite a dropoff in the MF once you get past Gulbrandsen and Abily. And you better hope you're getting the Gulbrandsen of Euro 2005 and not the Gulbrandsen of the 2007 World Cup and 2008 Olympics - where she was okay but not nearly the impact player of 2005.To be honest, I can't see Gulbrandsen filling the role in a 4-3-3. I mean Norway has a tradition of playing more 4-5-1. I'm a little bitter being a Sol fan but I want the league to survive and therefore all the teams to do reasonably well. All of the remaining teams now should for the next year or two. But somewhere down the road you'll be evaluating the team's management and, this is my counsel, when you look back on this time you better realize that there was a lot of luck involved here.
Yes, you are quite bitter, the post shows that, but I would be too if the team I supported folded on me because of what seems to be bad planning and a horrible business model. That said, fan outrage is what forced GP to change things up and forums like this are one of the ways that message got across. It's true because the GM (an the team in general) didn't start communicating to it's fan base until that fan base got pissed off here on BS. I'm a season ticket holder - I tried to get messages across directly to team management but the communication didn't start until the GM got on BS. I'd say the fan outrage on this forum made a difference. Has there been luck, good drafting, etc that played in the make-over? Of course, but that doesn't discount the grassroots effort that many fans made to get their voices (of displeasure) heard by the team. BS was a huge factor in doing that. Too discount that is to belittle the passion the local fan base has and the impact it had on the team. In the end, for a sports league without significant television $$ coming in, its small fan base can still have a say in what happens by threatening not to buy tickets without significant change.
These delusions of yours ... are they because of magic mushrooms or were you abducted by aliens? Equating the team's moves to your outrage is quite a stretch. I guess you're right ..... that the people who run this team are dummies, they have no clue why they finished last in the league. Then they discovered the site, listened to the garbage that you and the lover_of_child_molesters spewed on this forum, lo and behold, brand-spanking new team. Any stock tips for Kessler or Montoya? Betcha they'd love to hear that from you too.
No delusions at all. Simple facts. My point was that this forum is one of the ways that fans got their outrage through to management, and in fact, a very productive way since it wasn't until fans starting getting pissed here that the GM (or anybody from the team) actually started a dialogue with the fans. Did I ever mention specific moves, trades, etc? No, I'm talking about a significant change in the way the team communicates with their fan base, a corporate culture change if you will..... which was kind of easy since the team did nothing the entire first season. Look back at the posts on this forum. Try to get beyond the reading of each post for what it's author is saying at that specific moment and take the entire lot as a source of information... it demonstrated a devoted fan base pissed off at the way the team was being run, not just finishing last. Online forums, podcasts, social networking sights, etc. are how fans (and many other groups) get their messages across to corporations these days. In this case it worked, otherwise why would the GM have reacted the way in which she did? To calm fears and demonstrate that the team has heard the message and is making changes.
The good news: mids-up the new GP have so much talent I honestly think they could eat fast food instead of training all year and just show up and win half their games. They'll waltz through the season. The bad news: they weren't 4 on 20 because of the talent on their roster.