The USWNT steamrolled New Zealand 5-0 at Nippert Stadium in Cincinnati last night in front of an announced crowd of 30,596. Goals from Lindsey Horan, Mallory Pugh, Lynn Williams and a brace for Alex Morgan saw the States claim their second victory over the Kiwis in the space of five days following their 3-1 win in Commerce City, Colorado last Friday.
Marking Lionel Messi is like marking the smoke monster in Lost, even on a good day. When La Pulga is feeling particularly motivated, as he has been so far this season, it's like if the smoke monster could also teleport and shoot lasers.
Eibar found that out the hard way, finding themselves on the wrong side of a 6-1 demolition by Barcelona, four of which came from Messi.
Bayern Munich defeated Schalke 3-0 on Tuesday with James Rodriguez factoring heavily in his first Bundesliga start for the Bavarians. Robert Lewandowski opened the scoring from the spot, and James put Bayern up 2-0 before halftime with his first goal for the club. James then put the finishing touches on the victory with a fantastic feed for Arturo Vidal in the 75th minute.
Let’s be honest, we’ve probably just witnessed the most calamitous weekend Paris Saint-Germain will suffer all season in France’s Ligue 1. No PSG player was able to get on the scoresheet in their match against Lyon on Sunday, but the Parisian club still managed to win 2-0 by forcing two own goals to maintain their perfect start to the season.
Any thoughts Wayne Rooney had of a happy return to Manchester were ritually sacrificed by being set on fire and danced around by his former teammates.
To wit:
Antonio Valencia, who spent eight seasons as Rooney's teammate in red, welcomed his former captain back by thundering a volley past Jordan Pickford in the fourth minute.
In the space of a week, Manchester City has defeated Liverpool, Dutch champions Feyenoord and now Watford by a combined scoreline of 15-0. In those three matches, Argentinian striker Sergio Aguero has provided five goals and two assists, including a hat trick and an assist in Saturday’s 6-0 hammering of Watford at Vicarage Road.
Barcelona continue to set the pace at the top of La Liga following a spirited, come from behind victory at Getafe on Saturday. A wonder goal from Gaku Shibasaki gave Azulones a shock lead, but second half strikes from Denis Suarez and Paulinho maintained Barcelona’s perfect start to the season after four matches.
Grumblings of an early crisis on Tyneside appear to have been hugely premature on the back of another Newcastle United victory on Saturday, their third straight in the Premier League. With a 2-1 win against Stoke City, Newcastle climbed into the Champions League places and confirmed their finest start to life in England’s top division in six years.
True beat downs are rare in professional soccer, usually confined to mismatched tournament qualifiers and silly international friendlies. It's rare to see a beat down in a league match because in most leagues the top and bottom clubs are close enough to each other in terms of talent that the minnows can keep the outcome somewhat respectable.
Major League Soccer is a league that thrives on parity. The convoluted financial regulations keep all the teams spending roughly similar amounts and therefore with roughly similar talent levels.
Everyone knows the Champions League song, but not many folks know that it has lyrics and verses.
These are the lyrics, which I am not making up:
They are the best teams
They are the best teams
The main event