Sunday, July 30, 2006

Manchester's New Jersey Connection

The Manchester Derby could mean more this year for American fans

The start of the new EPL Campaign is just weeks away and today we saw firsthand that Claudio Reyna still has it as he scored the only goal in a 1-0 Man City win versus Bradford in a friendly. Across town however, it was another New Jersey native making news. Sir Alex Ferguson who has been taking bullets from departed striker Ruud Van Nistelrooy announced that Man Yoo is ready and willing to experiment with 18 year old New Jersey native Giuseppe Rossi up front. The problem for fans of the American game is that Rossi wants to play his international football for Italy and wants no part of the USA National Team. Considering Rossi is a possible Man Yoo starter at such a young age, chances are Italy will call him up soon for a full national cap and thus end our American dream.

I'm outright biased because I am a Man City fan ( I even got my new home kit with the white sleeves in the mail this week!) but it will be nice for those of us that love American soccer if Captain America and his squad can upset Man Yoo and Guiseppe ( US Soccer is not good enough for me) Rossi this year in the derby matches.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

Why the heck would Rossi want to play for the USA when he can play for Italy? K, you need to get off your jingoistic high horse and realize anybody with that optioon would play for Italy.

Anonymous said...

Rossi has made it perfectly clear he has no intention of ever playing for the USA. If you are going to hold a grudge against him, fine. He won't give a hoot.

Hernandez said...

why will he not play for usa when he can be biggest star over here while he is just another italiano futboler over there?

Hernandez said...

we should try and make rossi big offer to come to mls. that will also assure the next usa coach selects him.

Harvey said...

I like all of you am still holding out hope that Rossi who has played extensively for Italy at the U-21 level will come and play for us. I am dissapointed and somewhat put out by the fact that he regards us as a second rate soccer nation and that he seems to hold our soccer program with contempt.

Hopefully the hiring of a big name ala Klinsmann will convince him to play for us. Should we hire an MLS coach or just another USSF crony we could be in for a big letdown with both Rossi and Adu.

Harvey said...

Adu for the record has stated over and over again he wants to play for the USa but since Arena was so reluctant to give him a good look he has become frustrated and re-opened the Ghana option.

Kartik said...

Hernandez, I appreaciate the enthusiasim of you and the others in the Mexican American community who have embraced MLS, but the bottom line is a young player of Rossi's quality would never under any circumstance consider playing in MLS.

That's the unfortunate reality of the economic model MLS is using.

Kartik said...

Rafael, I am not sure if he was interested in talking to Arena about it. IRC Arena did try and talk to him, though I am not 100% sure that was the case.

Anonymous said...

Arena didn't go after Rossi hard after it was obvious Rossi wanted to play for Italy. Rossi actually played for Italy against the USA in a FIFA Youth event. I recall Freddy Adu outclassing him though, as we did quite well.

Anonymous said...

Rossi will NOT play for the US. Period, end of story.

Harvey said...

The next coach will have a big piece of food on his plate in trying to get Rossi to change his mind. It would be huge if he played for us.

Anonymous said...

Sorry, Rossi will not be playing for you stinking yanks!