CCL: Dynamo claim final spot

The Houston Dynamo's season isn't over just yet. Having been ousted in the first round of the MLS Cup by finalist New York, Houston turned its attention to the CONCACAF Champions League match against CD Luis Angel Firpo of El Salvador and won 1-0 at Robertson Stadium to secure the final berth in the CCL's quarterfinal round.

Brian Ching scored for Houston in the 13th minute off a Dwayne DeRosario corner kick and Houston held on to their slim lead, even when they went down a man due to Eddie Robinson's ejection in the 82nd minute after a foul on Firpo's Carlos Monteagudo.

Houston will be the lone Major League Soccer representative in the quarterfinals after DC United finished a miserable CCL campaign winless in six matches. USL Division 1 club Montreal, however, nearly won their group, advancing in the second spot in Group C.

The draw for the CCL quarterfinals will be held on December 10.

Sounders pick through the litter

The Seattle Sounders, MLS's 15th team, selected from the list of unprotected players and began to assemble the squad that will begin play next summer. Apparently they spent more on Ljunberg and Keller than I thought or they are planning another spending splurge soon because they went bargain hunting, selecting some head scratchers in Wednesday's expansion draft.

1. Nate Jaqua (Houston Dynamo) - 174K
2. Nathan Sturgis (Real Salt Lake) - 108K
3. Jeff Parke (New York Red Bulls) - 59K
4. Jarrod Smith (Toronto FC) - 36K
5. Khano Smith (New England Revolution) - 46K
6. Peter Vagenas (Los Angeles Galaxy) - 144K
7. Tyson Wahl (Kansas City Wizards) - 33K
8. James Riley (San Jose Earthquakes) - 33K
9. Stephen King (Chicago Fire) - 18K
10. Brad Evans (Columbus Crew) - 33K

The last two picks are probably the smartest. King and Evans will certainly pay back an investment of $51,000. And Pacific Northwest homeboy Jacqua is a good selection. Khano Smith is underrated, as is Jeff Parke, but Seattle is going to pay too much for Sturgis. And why would you want to spend that much on old Vagenas. I mean Vagenas is stinky. He doesn't get much play. Why would you pay that much for Vagenas? Even Amish teens on rumspringer would stay away from Vagenas at that price.

Sound choices for Seattle's draft

Since Freddie Ljungberg certainly counts as Seattle’s designated player and goalkeeper Kasey Keller was probably signed for around the 200K mark, the Sounders have about 1,800,000 to spend on an opening day roster.

The following is an assembled starting 11 that would be both economical and competitive. I'm not thrilled with Eddie Gaven (despite his recent resurgence with the MLS champions), but beggars can't be choosers. So I splurged on Rohan Ricketts. Don't you want 50 Cent sportin' a Sounders kit at his next concert? I’d like to put the rest on a gift certificate, Mr. Sajak.

GOALKEEPER

K. Keller (?)

DEFENDERS

C. Waibel (70K), I. Joy (120K), P. Ianni (108K), W. Barrett (149K)

MIDFIELDERS

R. Ricketts (213K), N. Grabavoy (90K), T. Cooke (173K), C. Ashe (33K)

FORWARDS

F. Ljungberg (?), E. Gaven (165K)

Note: 2008 salary in parenthesis

MLS draft? Already?!?

Well, sort of. Major League's newest franchise will be selecting among the league's unprotected players in a special draft on Wednesday. Having already signed a netminder and a goal-scorer, who will they go after to complete the team? And with Freddie Ljungberg up top and Kasey Keller between the posts, does it matter? Here's a list of decent players from each club with the fat excised (for a complete list click here):

Chivas USA
Razov, Ante
Suarez, Claudio
Talley, Carey
Victorine, Sasha

Chicago Fire
Brown, C.J.
Carr, Calen
Herron, Andy
King, Stephen
Prideaux, Brandon

Colorado Rapids
Burciaga, Jose
Cooke, Terry
Erpen, Facundo

Columbus Crew
Evans, Brad
Gaven, Eddie
Noonan, Pat
Oughton, Duncan

FC Dallas
Davino, Duilio

D.C. United
Doe, Francis
Dyachenko, Rod
Gallardo, Marcelo

Houston Dynamo
Ashe, Corey
Barrett, Wade
Ianni, Patrick
Mulrooney, Richard
Onstad, Pat
Waibel, Craig

Los Angeles Galaxy
Franchino, Joe
Kirovski, Jovan
Klein, Chris
Vagenas, Peter

New England Revolution
Smith, Khano
Thompson, Wells

New York Red Bulls
Magee, Mike
Wolyniec, John

Real Salt Lake
Deuchar, Kenneth
Joy, Ian
Kovalenko, Dema
Mathis, Clint
Williams, Andy

San Jose Earthquakes
Grabavoy, Ned
O'Brien, Ronnie

Toronto FC
Ricketts, Rohan
Ruiz, Carlos
Velez, Marco

In other news:

Wizards acquire forward Adam Cristman from New England for allocation money and Kansas City's natural 3rd round selection in the 2009 MLS SuperDraft. Bargain for KC.

TYH'S MLS BEST 11 (2008 Season)

GOALKEEPER

J. Busch (CHI)

DEFENDERS

J. Conrad (KC), M. Wynne (TFC), C. Marshall (CLB)

MIDFIELDERS

S. Kljestan (CHV), G.B. Schelotto (CLB), J. Morales (RSL), C. Blanco (CHI)

FORWARDS

L. Donovan (LA), J.P. Angel (NY), K. Cooper (DAL)

MLS Cup: Crew win, complete double

The Columbus Crew defeated the New York Red Bulls 3-1 in the 2008 MLS Cup at the Home Depot Center on Sunday, completing the MLS double (Supporters Shield and MLS Cup) and winning their first-ever Cup.

In a match that had TYH wishing he had put money on the match, Columbus played midnight to New York's Cinderella story, getting goals from Alejandro Moreno, Chad Marshall and Frankie Hejduk -- all assisted by MLS Cup MVP Guillermo Barros Schelotto.

Moreno opened the scoring in the 31st minute, taking a GBS thru pass and scoring with a low diagonal shot inside the far post. But Red Bull fans held out hope after their side equalized in the 51st minute, as John Wolyniec scored his second of the playoffs off a Dane Richards pass. But the hope was shortlived -- two minutes to be exact -- as the Crew regained the lead in the 53rd minute, with yet another Chad Marshall header off a GBS corner. With New York pressing in attack, GBS had one more bit of magic, chipping over the New York backline to Heydude, who headed over the onrushing Danny Cepero (Johnny swept the leg), and that's all she wrote.

Pretty


Prettier


Prettiest

Garber denies LanDo loan

MLS Commissioner Don Garber in his MLS State of the Union claimed that Landon Donovan has not been loaned to Bayern Munich, contrary to reports in the press to the contrary.

“We haven’t heard anything from Bayern Munich about Landon going on loan to that team,” the commissioner said in response to a question. “Let me remind everybody: contrary to what you might have read in the press, Landon Donovan is not on loan to Bayern Munich.”

LanDo recently completed a trial at the German giants, and according to reports in on ESPNsoccernet, a loan deal was completed.

FIFA blows!

Check out the draw for the Confederations Cup:

GROUP A: South Africa, Iraq, New Zealand and Spain.

GROUP B: Italy, Brazil, USA, Egypt.

Yeah, that's fair. I know they wanted to make it easy for the host country, but jeez, Italy and Brazil? Why not swap Egypt for Spain and really make it a challenging for the Yanks?

The Confederations Cup starts on June 14, 2009 in Johannesburg, South Africa (and likely ends for the Yanks two weeks later). I guess it will be a good blooding for whoever Bradley decides to take.