Lost amidst the scratched Frenchmen and bashed Irishmen during the opening day of the UEFA Nations League on Thursday was the start of the Concacaf Nations League. Kind of.
USWNT fans rejoice: Two major assets in Mallory Pugh and Kelley O’Hara have returned to the USWNT roster. Coach Jill Ellis announced the list of 23 players who would report to training camp for friendlies against Chile on Aug. 31 and Sept. 4 in California.
Our final roster before World Cup Qualifying is here. You with US? pic.twitter.com/0GqLS1SGOw
Major League Soccer has never won the Concacaf Champions League. D.C. United and the LA Galaxy each won the Concacaf Champions Cup, the tournament's precursor, but the league has had no luck in the current competition, which began play in 2008.
That Concacaf Champions League drought finally ended on Wednesday, kind of.
LAFC’s academy team won the U-13 Concacaf Champions League title on Wednesday, defeating Junior Tampicos of Mexico 2-0 in the final.
Champions!!!
Alphonso Davies is no stranger to the world stage despite being just 17 years old. After an MLS transfer record deal with Bayern Munich, he’ll be a regular on it.
It’s official. Panama will be the 2018 World Cup last place team, finishing 32nd out of 32 teams in Russia. Los Canaleros were in the World Cup for the first time, but other than a goal against England, it was a tournament to forget.
In a tournament with surprising parity throughout, Panama was the lone outlier, piling up poor results and not exactly bringing pride to the Concacaf region.
Costa Rica lost two tough matches to start the 2018 World Cup. The 2014 quarterfinalist was a few moments away from earning two draws but instead took two losses. But the Switzerland vs Costa Rica match finished 2-2, giving Los Ticos a deserved point from their stay in Russia, even if it came thanks to an odd own goal.
Let’s be honest here. Panama was bad on Sunday. Really bad. Los Canaleros embarrassed Concacaf and every Concacaf nation that didn’t qualify, although no specific nations immediately come to mind. The 6-1 loss for Panama vs England was the worst performance of any team thus far at the World Cup.
England’s putting on a finishing clinic versus Panama to begin Sunday’s World Cup group play. John Stones sent a precise downward header beyond Jaime Penedo to open the scoring, Harry Kane added England’s second with an emphatic penalty and Jesse Lingard added the third with one of the best goals of the tournament so far. A second from Stones and another Kane penalty has England up 5-0 at the half.
Here’s the opener from Stones.
The United States is not in the 2018 World Cup and Costa Rica just showed the world why. No matter how skilled a team is (or isn’t), it is extremely difficult to beat a Concacaf side like Costa Rica, Panama or Honduras. But a stoppage-time Philippe Coutinho goal vs Costa Rica was just enough to get Brazil a vital three points with a 2-0 win and knock Los Ticos out of the tournament on Friday in Russia.
You don’t stand in the way of an Aleksander Kolarov rocket. That’s a well-known fact, and if you’re the least bit ignorant about that, you’re dead. Just look at what happened to this ref back in the day.