Soccer is moving up in America!

Today was a huge day of success for professional soccer in the USA. This evening will be important as well!
First, the cover of FIFA 12 was officially unveiledtoday and it sports LA Galaxy and United States star Landon Donovan on it's cover for the second year in a row. To Donovan's right is Red Bull New York star Rafa Marquez. Last year Donovan also starred on the cover, however he was inUS National team gear. The new game cover is shown below.

Then it was announced that NBC networks had acquired the rights to air MLS games beginning in 2012. NBC will broadcast two regular-season games, two playoffs games and two USMNT games. The rest will be on the NBC Sports Network (currently known as Versus). This is a major accomplishment for professional soccer to be on a major network that reaches so many more households in America than Fox Soccer Channel did.

As almost every USA Soccer fan knows, today is Jurgen Klinsmann’s debut as manager of the USMNT. As I said in yesterday’s post, Klinsmann is instituting quite a few changes as coach. Some of the changes include Klinsmann only putting the player’s numbers on the back of the jersey. However Klinsmann is only numbering the starting players 1-11. The reserves will be numbered 12-18. This is an interesting change for the team. However, Klinsmann is also removing the player’s last names from the back of the jerseys to bring the players to recognize that the name on the front of the jersey is more important than the name on the back. This concept is very South American and European in nature. This is a very interesting move on Klinsmann’s behalf.

How do you feel about Klinsmann’s new team decisions and the new partnership between MLS and NBC. Match made in heaven or not so much? I will have another blog post this evening after the game is over. Let’s go USA!

Jurgen's Decisions: Injuries and Captiancy

Jurgen Klinsmann has been busy making decisions as the new head coach of the United States Men's National Team. Klinsmann is making the expected new decisions (including -new captaincy, new formations, and bringing in new young players). Then, he has to make the unexpected quick decisions regarding injuries and then the subsequent player changes.

Jurgen Klinsmann's first US men's national team roster has been plagued by injuries. The changes began with Timmy Chandler being removed from the roster due to an injury. Chandler was replaced by Zach Loyd of FC Dallas. A few days after Chandler was replaced, Maurice Edu was swapped for Robbie Rogers (of the Columbus Crew) to Edu's calf strain. The third player injured and removed from the roster is Clarence Goodson. Goodson has a hamstring injury that club doctors advised him not to play on, due to risk of further injury. Due to how recent Goodson's injury came about, no replacement has been made.

The new captaincy is an interesting issue as well. Carlos Bocanegra has served as captain during Bob Bradley's tenure. Now that the Bradley era is over, a new captain will be named. In my opinion, I would like to see Landon Donovan or Tim Howard serve as the new captain.

Will the sudden player changes and new captaincy make a major impact in how the team plays tomorrow?

Leave your comments below about who you think should be captain of the USMNT!

A Place to Start!

Hello everyone!

I am a die-hard US Men's National Team fan, and a huge soccer fan as a whole!

So, today I decided to start a blog to talk about my favorite thing, soccer!

Being a soccer fan in the United States has not always been easy, however soccer in the USA is on the rise at the moment and is becoming more popular day by day.

This past weekend, I attended Lollapalooza, a Music Festival in Chicago. Everyday I attended, I saw thousands of soccer jerseys! Everyday, I saw hundreds of USA National Team jerseys and MLS Jerseys. Seeing all of these fans representing their favorite USA Teams was amazing!

However, the icing on top of the cake for me, was this past Saturday night. On Saturday, I wore a USA Jozy Altidore jersey, and as I was walking back from the Eminem concert at Lollapalooza, on Saturday night, I was surrounded by chants of "Altidore! Altidore! Altidore!" However, they didn't stop there, the fans proceeded to chant. Only This time they chanted, "Jooo.... Jozy, ooh, ahh, I wanna knooow will you score a goal? Landon.... Landon Donovan oooh ahh I wanna knooow that we'll destroy Mexico!"

Hopefully, these fellow USA fans are right, and Landon will help usher the USMNT into the first win of the Klinsmann era of USA Soccer. (We'll know on Wednesday)

Secondly, today was a bit of a shock in the USA Soccer world as former USA National Team coach, Bob Bradley was offered the coaching job of the Egyptian National Team. Apparently, Bob has been on the Egyptian federation's radar ever since the USA shocked the soccer world by beating the African Champions, Egypt 3-0 in the 2009 Confederations Cup.

Do you think Egypt would be a good fit for Bob Bradley? Please leave your thoughts below.

Well, that is all for now on the first post of USA Soccer Thoughts!

Come back soon!

Follow me on twitter @MKDovellos for more soccer thoughts and commentary!