Because “alliteration” and “getting hits because people google Christian Pulisic‘s name a lot” are two of my favorite things. As always, hit the comment section, Twitter, Facebook, or e-mail if you have something you wan t me to share in one of these posts.
National team talk. Been a while since an extended section on the national team. Here we go. Christian Pulisic will be with the team for some of the Summer’s friendlies:
Should be some chances to see him (maybe even in Nashville?) even though Dortmund/Liverpool will not be played in Music City. If not… I’ll take the MNT even without its biggest star. Josh Sargent should be playing at least in the May/June friendlies (full roster projection from ASN here).
Film room on midfielder Tyler Adams:
First, let’s take a look at his passing. He’s a player who can pick out a pass from anywhere as well as control the game with the tempo of passing. Check out this pass:
Adams shows us two very good things here. First, look at how he fits the pass through four defenders, splitting two of them with pure precision. The pass by itself is crazy, but his work ethic is also demonstrated here. After he makes one of the best passes of the year, he makes a 50-yard dead sprint to follow the play. In one play you can see his passing and his work ethic on display.
Much much more at the link. Not going to do an extensive blockquote on two separate film reviews, but this one on keeper Zack Steffen is v. good, as well. (Y’all know I love me some film room).
The German-American recruiting pipeline might dry up as we move farther away from heavily-used military bases in Deutschland, but there can still be the occasional dual-national to potentially recruit down the line.
Should MLS reconfigure conferences? It’s not, like, a huge priority to me, but I can get on board with a 26-plus team league being split into three, rather than two, conferences:
However, as MLS prepares to add markets 24 and 25 with Miami and Nashville while remaining on the cusp of announcing a 26th team very, very likely to be Cincinnati, it may be time to reintroduce the Central Division.
League structure of MLS is something I’m not super-interested in (at least as a big-picture thought exercise, of which regular readers know I’m very fond), but certainly it will be relevant to our interests in Nashville within the next couple years.
As long as the teams you’re directly competing with for the playoffs are all on the schedule home and away, whatever happens with the remaining games, and however many conferences there are, whatever. Also let’s make the playoffs not last into December.
Political support for the World Cup bid. A House resolution supporting the join 2026 bid passed. It will shock you to find out who tweeted support for the bid while managing to be (remain) the most passive-aggressive dude on the planet:
…without further comment on that one. (Except to say that, in a total non-shocker, the “aggressive” part of being passive-aggressive was likely a violation of FIFA rules – at least not as direct as the violations being committed by the only competitor, I guess?).
Stadium stuuuuuuuuff. The concept of this article assuming that Steve Glover (who is transparently lying) is telling the truth is… troubling. The story was written after Hasting’s Tuesday town hall, so the availability of those two guys gives them a bit of credibility to the reporter, but the credibility of the reporter is clearly compromised in a pretty serious way here.
“They pretended like we have committed ourselves to a location,” said Councilman Glover.
That is an obvious lie. There is no circumstance under which that can be considered truthful. For the writer to not at least question it WHEN YOU CAN READ THE RESOLUTION YOURSELF is journalistic malfeasance (indeed, not even considering this is unacceptable journalism). The resolution that passed commits the council, city, and team to a location.
“We are not trying to show any disrespect for any of the hardworking individuals who put the MLS deal together,” said [District 2 constituent] Hilton, “we just want to make sure they understand that North Nashville wants to be a part of this conversation. It may not be a good fit, but we want to be at the table.”
DeCosta Hastings was at the table. He voted for the resolution. If you have a problem, it’s with your incompetent councilman, not with never having been given a seat at the table.. He has suddenly changed his tune because another councilman who is simply trying to make sure soccer doesn’t happen anywhere in Nashville is manipulating him into it. Good job, good effort.
In other stadium news…
A third kind of football (the rugby variety) trying to make Williamson County its national hotbed. Mostly just an interesting little sports-related article, aside from one throwaway line:
A rendering of the 120-acre facility shows a U.S. Olympic rugby training site and the corporate headquarters for USA Rugby. The complex also could house soccer and lacrosse.
A partnership with your friendly local MLS team for academy and training purposes could be interesting. Of course, a home for an eventual NSC2, whether USL or lower-division is something I’ve previously advocated having in Williamson, as well.
Etc. Where national team members played their youth soccer. …I keep trying (and failing) to dislike the Chattahooligans, I swear. I don’t have much difficulty disliking the Eastern European Ultra CosPlay Club of Oakland County, but Chattanooga dropped the first half of its home-and-home with Detroit City FC. … Speaking of Detroit, I remain dumbfounded at the tone of the local media coverage of their MLS bid. Are they just trying to lead readers on? Ain’t happening in Ford Field, folks. … Soc Takes on the perils of owning a lower-division soccer team in the United States. … I agree that the rift between USSF and high school soccer is bad for development. .. Podcast spotlighting Nashville SC CEO Court Jeske. … Pivoting this site to become an attendance blog (a.k.a. FC Cincinnati blog).
I didn’t google the names of vape brands for this to get a mere one retweet, by the way:
Club and Country 