LA Galaxy to make History in USA Soccer

I hope you do well, but it sounds like you're bringing the B team. I wouldn't expect great results against Leverkusen and Roma with that lineup.

 

What do you mean with our B-Team? Cobi Jones probably won't be figuring in with the Nats at the Confederations Cup, nor will Lalas (obviously). It's feasible that Elliott will be with New Zealand and that Califf and Victorine may or may not be with the USMNT in France. I think that who is left over will be fine in this tournament. Our defense is solid even with Califf gone since we've still got Tyrone Marshall and Ezra Hendricksen who can play in the back along with Hong and Lalas. The midfield may be a bit tired, but there's enough depth there to make up for it, especially if it gives Memo a chance to play in some big games. I think they'll be fine.

 

Interesting read. I've never heard of this tourney before. I thought they were bringing back the World Club Championship for a moment (supposedly that was ended a few years back). Thesae teams, are they just randomly selected, or is there a qualification process for it?

 

Everything I've read, it would seem to be those are the teams they could get, no deeper selection process. For all but the Galaxy and perhaps the Korean team (don't know much about their season), this will be an off-season training tournament. Totally meaningless. Sorry.

 

MLS and USSF will allow the Galaxy to be at their best for this tourney. Even if there were some Galaxy players under consideration for the Gold Cup or Confederation Cup, they probably are out of the picture now. This tourney is much more important to the none-uefa clubs. Good luck to the Galaxy.

 

That is why the Galaxy will do really well. They will be in-season form. The other squads will treat it like a holiday. And to american fans all they will see is that an MLS team beat Roma and Leverkusen. It will be seen as a big victory for MLS if they perform well.

 

2 million for the winner is hardly meaningless and the promotion to another market for the visiting teams also has monetary value.. No professional team that is invited will look at it as meaningless, unless they are not really a professional organization.

 

Am I the only one who thinks this is really great that LA has been chosen to represent CONCACAF?? I may be reading too much into it, but that sounds like major recognition of MLS to me.

 

It's partly that there is the Hong conection and also that the Galaxy were also to attend the world club championships last year which were cancelled.
The event will happen every two years so look for other countries from the region to be represented in the future.

 

It's a nice thing. Not huge, but nice.

Not as important as, say, consistently drawing 20,000 + at home, but nice.

 

The Hong connection hadnt occured to me, but I think we can all agree that its a good thing. If its true the guy is already reaping dividends and he hasnt played a minute yet.

 

Teams are invitees.

Sao Paulo will be in mid-season form. They're already playing in the Paulista championship and the national championship (the Brasileirao) starts in March. They're planning on taking 20 days off from the Brasileirao for travel and prep related to this tourney.

Sao Paulo also has a local soccer academy in Korea, so they want to show well.

And they won the Intercontinental (now Toyota) Cup back-to-back in 92 and 93 - the last team to do so.

 

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Originally posted by "art"
Everything I've read, it would seem to be those are the teams they could get, no deeper selection process. For all but the Galaxy and perhaps the Korean team (don't know much about their season), this will be an off-season training tournament. Totally meaningless. Sorry.
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Originally posted by "Wolves 67"
2 million for the winner is hardly meaningless and the promotion to another market for the visiting teams also has monetary value.. No professional team that is invited will look at it as meaningless, unless they are not really a professional organization.
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Yes indeed, 2 million is not peanuts for some of the teams in this tournament.
And so, this raises an important question:
1) Will the roster for each team be preset at some deadline date? Will loaned players be allowed to participate?
I mean, who is to say that Sao Paulo(or any other team in this tourny) would not ask Real Madrid for a Ronaldo loan(or any other top world player) for a 2-3 month stint, just for the purpose of playing in the tourney and give them an advantage. Of course, this applies to all teams here, not just Sao Paulo.

 

Along those lines, Cruzeiro hired Bebeto in 1997 specifically for their Intercontinental Cup match against Dortmund. Didn't work.

But anyway, I doubt the organizers will have any interest in stopping a team from bringing in a player or two just for this tourney. They probably wouldn't mind the extra publicity that something like that would bring.

 

I guess it's "Guns for Hire."

Then the teams here with the most money to spend will gain the advantage.

 

It's possible, but unlikely that anyone will spend big bucks to bring in hired guns. The Cruzeiro - Bebeto adventure failed and I don't recall many similar attempts. Now that I think about it, I believe that Cruzeiro's other striker in that game, Donizete, was also a hired gun. Cruzeiro became something of a laughingstock for a while.

This tourney apparently has more cash at stake - the SPFC site claims it's the most prize money ever offered for a club tournament - but still, most clubs won't gamble lots of cash on hired guns who may as likely disrupt the squad and create resentment as anything else.

 

Ok, good point, but I hardly think Leverkeusen or Roma will lose any sleep over not performing well in this tournament. Bottom line is that this will mean far more to Galaxy fans than anyone else.

 

I have been waiting for this moment since the conception of MLS. I see this as a movement towards more respect for Amercian soccer. We will finally be able to see our "best team" take on some of the most well respected club teams in the world. If the Galaxy are able to perform well at this tournament who knows what this could accomplish for attendance or even bring in some more quality foriegn players. Good luck to the Galaxy on this amazing opportunity.

 

I doubt if something like this would happen. If it did, the Gals have a contingency plan. They'll borrow back Luis Hernandez. He might have an outside chance of getting some of Chris Albright's minutes.

 

I wonder how many moonies will be at the matches handing out fliers?

tommy "gotta love the reverend Moon" mack