SOCCER : It’s Been Year to Forget for These U.S. Stars
They were, at one point in the not too distant past, three of the brightest stars in U.S. soccer, a trio of players who made themselves household names, at least in soccer households.
But this has not been the best of years for forward Eric Wynalda, midfielder Tab Ramos and goalkeeper Tony Meola.
Until this past week, all three had spent virtually the entire Major League Soccer season on the sideline, banished there by injury.
* Wynalda, the U.S. national team’s all-time leading goal scorer, tore a ligament in his left knee during the MLS off-season while playing in the Mexican league. He has yet to play an MLS game this year.
* Ramos, the best midfield dribbler produced in the U.S., was injured in the New York/New Jersey MetroStars’ opener, played a couple of games in July, then tore his right quadriceps muscle and hasn’t been seen since.
* Meola loosened several teeth and cut his lip badly in a goalmouth collision while playing for the U.S. against Mexico on Feb. 14. He then tore a ligament in his left knee on March 17, three days before the Kansas City Wizards’ opener.
But things are looking up.
And, as usual with all three, their comments continue to burn bridges ahead and behind them.
Meola finally made his debut for the Wizards last Wednesday, in a 2-0 loss to the Fire in Chicago. Wynalda could make his season debut today against Meola in Kansas City. And Ramos is rumored to be returning next weekend.
How long Ramos will be with the MetroStars, however, is another matter. Only some floating debris remains from the wreck of the team’s 1999 season. The playoffs are no longer an option and everyone’s future is in doubt.
“I’m not sure what’s going to happen,” Ramos told New York’s Daily News. “There might be changes between now and December. I’m definitely going to be playing. I’ve made it pretty clear I don’t want to play for another team in this league. I’m not interested in playing in Colorado or Kansas City. I don’t want to live in any of those places.”
Wynalda, who in June was dealt from the faltering San Jose Clash to the equally precariously balanced Miami Fusion, was given medical clearance in midweek.
“The doctors have given me the OK to play,” he told the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel. “That basically means they feel the knee is able enough to withstand a hit. I haven’t spoken with [Coach] Ivo [Wortmann]. The thing that needs to be clear is that I’m still day-to-day despite how close I am.”
If he doesn’t play today, Wynalda could be back in the lineup when the Galaxy plays the Fusion on Saturday in Fort Lauderdale.
STILL STINGING
Wynalda still is angry at the Clash for the way he perceives he was treated in San Jose.
When the Clash recently traded away El Salvador’s Raul Diaz Arce, the league’s all-time leading scorer, Wynalda was quick to comment.
It was odd, he pointed out, how Diaz Arce couldn’t score for San Jose and yet started grabbing goals immediately upon his arrival with the Tampa Bay Mutiny.
NO FEAR
Like Wynalda, Meola has been known to open mouth and insert cleats, but he was correct when describing his not-so-Wizard teammates to the Kansas City Star.
“When I look at the team, I almost think we have too many nice guys,” he said. “It’s a great group of guys. Sometimes you can’t be so nice when you are out on the field. When I look at the D.C.s of the world and L.A. and Chicago, they know how to step up and put a little fear in the opponent.”
He reserves more pointed barbs for his former team, the MetroStars.
“I wasn’t upset about being traded,” he told Ike Kuhns of New Jersey Online. “I was upset about being lied to.
“They made mistakes and they know it. They can’t disguise them. You can’t just overhaul a team every single year and think you are going to be good. It just doesn’t work, and the MetroStars have proven it.”
SEEING RED
Rich Grady was to have been the referee in Saturday night’s game between the Galaxy and the Burn in Dallas, but U.S. Soccer yanked him.
Why?
Because a week earlier Grady had handed out an MLS-record four red cards in a game between Washington D.C. United and Miami at Fort Lauderdale.
Esse Baharmast, U.S. Soccer’s director of officials, met with Grady but declined to reveal what was said, other than commenting that no disciplinary action would be taken against the referee.
Isn’t removing him from his next assignment disciplinary action?
W-LEAGUE
World champions Christie Pearce and Sara Whalen are part a W-League all-star team that plays the University of Connecticut today in an exhibition game in Storrs, Conn.
Pearce played for the New Jersey Lady Stallions last season, while Whalen rejoined the Long Island Lady Riders after the Women’s World Cup this summer.
The all-star team also contains several players from the W-League champion Raleigh Wings, including former U.S. national team player Staci Wilson. The Wings, paced by World Cup star Cindy Parlow, defeated the Chicago Cobras to successfully defend their national title.
CONCACAF CHAMPIONS CUP
By tonight, Central America’s three representatives in next month’s CONCACAF Champions Cup in Las Vegas will be known.
A final series of playoff games takes place today in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, where Alajuela of Costa Rica plays Comunicaciones of Guatemala and Olimpia of Honduras plays Saprissa of Costa Rica.
The top three teams in the round-robin playoff will join defending CONCACAF champion Washington D.C. United and the Chicago Fire of MLS, Necaxa and Toluca of Mexico and Caribbean champion Joe Public of Trinidad & Tobago in the Sept. 28-Oct. 3 finals.
The winner of that tournament advances to the inaugural FIFA World Club Championship in Brazil in January.
OPPORTUNITY IN MEXICO
Necaxa, the Mexican league team that knocked the Galaxy out of the CONCACAF Champions Cup a couple weeks ago, is up for sale.
Grupo Televisa, Mexico’s sometimes all-too-powerful television network, has put the team on the block after it continued to draw poorly at Azteca Stadium despite winning three league championships in the 1990s.
Alejandro Burillo Azcarraga, a Televisa vice president, said some buyer interest has been expressed, but added that Televisa would like to see the new owner move the team out of Mexico City, where it plays in the shadow of Televisa’s other two teams, Club America and Atlante.
“It’s not so much the price, but the conditions,” Burillo Azcarraga said. “We want Necaxa to go where fans fill the stadium and the players feel content.”
Hmmm. Seems like a good opportunity for Galaxy owner Philip Anschutz to buy Necaxa, move it to Los Angeles, and then test in court the right of FIFA, U.S. Soccer or the Mexican federation to ban him from doing so.
A Los Angeles-based team playing in the Mexican league has long been a dream of many fans, but no one has yet been willing to brave the legal battle it would entail.
If Anschutz wants to make money out of soccer in L.A., however, what better way than to build the stadium he has planned and have the Galaxy and Necaxa both play there, the former in MLS competition and the latter in the Mexican league?
Hey, at least it’s worth an argument.
CZECH, MATE
Czech Republic midfielder Pavel Nedved had no hesitation in predicting that his team, Lazio, would defeat European champion Manchester United in the European Super Cup.
“Manchester United is one of the strongest sides in the world, but if we play like we know how to play, it won’t even be a match,” Nedved said.
And so it proved. A 35th minute goal by Chile’s Marcelo Salas gave the Italian team, which last season won the European Cup Winners’ Cup and was runner-up in Serie A, a deserved 1-0 victory Friday night at the Stade Louis II in Monaco.
