CORNER KICKS
1 Cuauhtemoc Blanco might be one tired player by the time he joins Major League Soccer’s Chicago Fire in July on a salary of $2.6 million a year.
The Club America and Mexico national team striker could play in four tournaments by then, and just how much he will have left for a four-month MLS stretch run is debatable.
Tonight, Club America will play Santos of Brazil in Rio de Janeiro in the quarterfinals of South America’s Copa Libertadores. The first leg in Mexico City ended 0-0.
Blanco and friends then return to Mexico on Thursday and play in the first leg of the Mexican final Friday. The second game is Sunday.
Club America forward Santiago Fernandez said the team wants to give Blanco the chance “of leaving with the title he deserves,” but Pachuca, the reigning CONCACAF and Copa Sudamericana champion, is favored.
Meanwhile, Mexico Coach Hugo Sanchez has included Blanco, 34, in his preliminary squad for the June 6-24 Gold Cup in the U.S. and the June 26-July 15 Copa America in Venezuela.
2 Alexi Lalas and Manny Lagos were teammates on the U.S. team at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics. Now, Lalas runs the Galaxy and Lagos is director of soccer operations for the St. Paul-based Minnesota Thunder.
That background explains why David Beckham and the Galaxy will be playing in the Metrodome in Minneapolis on Oct. 10 against a yet-to-be-named international opponent in the latest addition to the Galaxy’s already crowded schedule.
Lagos said he expects the exhibition to draw more than the 46,164 who came out to see Pele play for the New York Cosmos against the Minnesota Kicks in 1976.
3 Four-time MLS champion D.C. United has been invited to take part in the 2007 Copa Sudamericana, and at Tuesday’s draw in Buenos Aires it was paired with Chivas de Guadalajara in the first round.
The MLS team took part in the tournament in 2005, but after tying Universidad Catolica of Chile, 1-1, in Washington in its opener, it lost the return game in Santiago, 3-2, and was ousted.
4 Nantes will play its last match of the French season on Sunday, and when the final whistle sounds an era will come to an end.
The team, an eight-time French champion, has been relegated to a lower division, ending a record 44 consecutive years in the top flight.
“I can understand why the fans are angry,” said Rudi Roussillon, Nantes’ chairman.
5 One of the smartest moves made after last summer’s World Cup was the acquisition by Germany’s VfB Stuttgart of Mexican internationals Pavel Pardo and Ricardo Osorio.
With the help of the midfielder and defender, Stuttgart has won the Bundesliga title for the first time in 15 years and on Saturday can “do the double” if it defeats Nuremberg in the German Cup final at Berlin’s Olympic Stadium.
--GRAHAME L. JONES
