Good news, Fire faithful, there will be no Clean Sheet column next week.
Next week you'll have to turn your hatred and nasty e-mails to someone else. I nominate my man, veteran soccer scribe Steve Davis.
I'm a big backer of you guys getting No Neck Blanco, but he thinks it's a bad idea to add a player that people around the league will pay to see play, or at the very least they will pay to throw celery at him (read last week's column). Plus, he is a Dallas-based guy. And he once told me Brian Urlacher is softer than Cristiano Ronaldo.
I say, let him have it.
Anyway, next week I will be across the pond on "vacation," if that's what you can call schlepping the 13-month-old Prince of the Palace around France while the Queen practices busting my chops in French.
She doesn't speak a word of the language, but she has ordered me around every way possible in English, so smart money says she is fluent by middle of next week just so she can tell me in a new language how lazy I am.
My sole respite is the outside chance that we get to see the France-Austria friendly set for next Wednesday in Paris. It is the light at the end of the tunnel that is taking a 1-year-old on an all-night flight from Planet LA to Paris.
But much like President Josiah Bartlett in The West Wing, I love a long flight, because it gives you a chance to clear your head. You can think about things like how bad television is these days that you still reference The West Wing.
But assuming the Prince sacks out (as a result of my accidentally dumping a gallon or three of baby Benadryl down his throat) and the airline is kind enough to show Miss Congeniality 4 or some other awful movie to distract the Queen long enough, there is a lot happening right now that I would just like to have a nice think about.
THE NEWS: Cobi Jones will retire after this season.
TCS SAYS: When you read the media coverage of the announcement and the subsequent looks back at his career, you read a lot about the big stuff like getting cut twice at ODP to all the big goals or assists he recorded for club and country. The guy has created some great memories.
But with his braided locks and style of play, he is the kind of player that fans who hate the Galaxy love to hate. But I don't think of any of that any more when I think about Cobi. I think of just one thing, and that is Cobi holding the ball in the corner to run out the clock during the World Cup. In that one instant, he went from flashy West Coast player to gritty and savvy veteran taking a beating in crunch time to lead his team in the grandest stage of all. That one thing is his legacy in my book.
THE NEWS: Wanna know how you win a battle between two goalkeepers?
TCS SAYS: Hear about the Spurs-Watford match over the weekend? It was a matchup of Tottenham's Paul Robinson and Watford's Ben Foster, two of the 'keepers who will fight to wear the England No. 1 jersey next summer in Austria at Euro 2008.
Robinson won. How do we know? He went out and scored on Foster by himself. From his own end of the field. Yup, drove a dead ball all the way down the field, which took a bad hop over a helpless Foster and into the goal.
That's how you win a job.
THE NEWS: How great is YouTube for soccer clips?
TCS SAYS: Go see the Robinson goal, or check out the new David Beckham "Impossible is Nothing" adidas commercial, in which he talks about some of his tougher times. Pretty cool.
THE NEWS: Direct Kick fans, you are back in business.
TCS SAYS: The package will be available once again on DirecTV, Dish Network and from your cable company. You get a free preview opening weekend, and then again July 4 weekend if you haven't coughed up the dough by then.
Oh, and Red Bull supporters/former Metro sufferers, you got the good news Wednesday that the Bulls will be on MSG this year. Which is also good news for all of us who buy the package, because we get to hear JP Dellacamera and Shep Messing for another year, one of the best duos in the domestic game.
Speaking of television, how about that 4.3 million people watched last Sunday's Chivas-America match on Univision here in The States? Wow.
THE NEWS: The Hoops ship Richard Mulrooney north of the border.
TCS SAYS: I don't know how much the FC Dallas organization has heard from the fans after this deal, but I could just forward them along some of the stuff that has made its way into my inbox. There needs to be another shoe dropping after this one.
Will they trade for Shalrie Joseph? Will they use the cap space, allocation, etc. to bring in some outside help? I think the feeling was summed up by this line from a Dallas supporter: "As a frustrated FCD fan I wanted to use another word besides 'crap' in my subject line but as a good Christian man I had to refrain."
THE NEWS: Am I the only one who tolerates Portugal's national team?
TCS SAYS: People love to hate them, but I have always enjoyed watching them play. Then again, I did rip Ronaldo right at the beginning of this column, didn't I? Anyway, for all of you who love to paint them as a bunch of diving wussies, you'll love the fact that Deco is going to miss their next two Euro 2008 qualifiers after undergoing surgery - on a finger. Missing a soccer game with a hurt finger? OK, maybe they are soft.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, kudos to the bottle shown by Morelia over the weekend. They scored a late goal to beat Monterrey 1-0 ... and did so with only eight men.
THE NEWS: Romario is in the midst of trying to score his 1,000th career goal.
TCS SAYS: But apparently the Brazilian admits a lot of the goals have come away from competitive professional matches. You see, his personal count includes matches like youth games, testimonials and all-star games.
OK, this is getting a little shady. What's he going to do if he falls a couple short, go pop in "FIFA 2002" on Playstation and have his character bang in a couple goals against Albania and then alert the media???
During the season, The Clean Sheet runs each week on MLSnet. Views and opinions expressed in this column views and opinions are the author's, and not necessarily those of Major League Soccer or MLSnet.com. Send any questions and comments to tcsresponses@yahoo.com
