Columbus Crew end their ‘09 season in a playoff match that showcased everything wrong with MLS. #crew

Astroheader twittering the Crew game

We at Astroheader have complained about the FIFA World Rankings before. FIFA has outdone themselves with the October 2009 version. Just an FYI, these rankings came out after the last round of World Cup qualifying on October 14th. UEFA still has to play their play-off rounds.

• To start the BS, Croatia, who failed to qualify for the World Cup, moved up one spot to 8th. Makes sense.
• Argentina moved up two positions to 6th for barely making it in the last day of qualifying.
• Portugal, who has not even qualified yet and has to play in the UEFA playoffs, moved up seven positions to 10th. Who the hell are they stroking off at FIFA?
• The Czech Republic, who also failed to qualify for the World Cup, moved up three positions to 15th.
• And by far one of the most awesome examples of the stellar ranking system, Denmark. Denmark won their group (over high ranking Portugal) and was one of the first teams to qualify out of Europe but dropped eleven places to 27th.
• Serbia dropped seven positions for qualifying. Thanks for playing.

In a related story of FIFA douchebaggery:

The European playoffs for the World Cup are comprised of eight teams that play an additional home and home series for the last four places from the European region. At the beginning of qualification, these teams would be paired together by the means of a BLIND draw. Which means eight names go into a bucket, and are pulled at random.

After qualifying, since some of the bigger squads failed to qualify like France and Portugal (read above), FIFA decided against the blind draw and seeded the teams. Guess which teams got seeded and which got F’ed.

Results from the blind… err staged FIFA draw;

• Russia v Slovenia
• Greece v Ukraine
• Portugal v Bosnia
• Ireland v France

TWITTER banned our account today for some reason. Looking into it…

***UPDATE***

We’re back. No explanation, but we’re back on Twitter nonetheless.

ASTROHEADER is now also on Twitter, and before you judge us… we have a good reason. Many of our thoughts don’t go beyond one sentence but are captivating enough to bring you the immense joy you expect from Astroheader. Before, they were lost forever. Now, they are tweets.

Also, live commentary during games will be fun for us all!

ASTROHEADER on Twitter

What? It’s not as if my absence from posting caused me to miss commenting on anything important in American soccer.

Actually, I have been taking care of a newborn (human) baby (mine) and have truthfully barely had time to watch the games, much less comment on them. So in the interest of summary, I give you the TEN BY TEN: 10 point of discussion in 10 words each.

USA v ITALY – oh, come on guys. you can do better than that.
USA v BRAZIL – oh, come ON guys. can you do better than that?
USA v EGYPT – luckiest circumstance in the history of US soccer. nice game.
USA v SPAIN – greatest day of my life. GREATEST DAY of my LIFE.
USA v BRAZIL: THE SEQUEL – expected result unfolded painfully. Donovan’s goal: USA at its best
BOB BRADLEY – please stop giving the wrong players chances game after game.
GOLD CUP – would have preferred a real team. we tied Haiti? WTF.
DONOVAN v BECKHAM – Beckham do your job. Donovan please find a better club.
ONYEWU TO AC MILAN – another euro pinerider? hopefully he becomes a powerhouse in Italy.
AGUIRRE BANNED FOR KICKING A PLAYER – ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

The following is a short list of items that are NOT something:

-Clint Dempsey’s moves
-Sacha Kljestan, DaMarcus Beasley, Brian Ching on the field
-Adu, Torres on the bench
-flubbing shots from the six
-hitting the crossbar
-playing long ball to Jozy Altidore more than once per game
-marking respectable opponents from 20 feet away
-beating CONCACAF teams
-Bob Bradley’s coaching decisions in general
-Landon donovan’s penalty kicks
-red cards
-sucking
-losing

In general, when I hear someone complain about referees, I dismiss it. The ref is too easy a scapegoat upon whose cereal coaches, players, and fans figuratively shit. But last night’s best-versus-best match-up, in my opinion, was legitimately marred by a flurry of poor judgment. Yellow cards tend to lose their “I mean business” effect when you give out 265 of them in a match… and 3 penalty kicks—all of which were questionable—made it tough to discern who deserved to win from who actually did.

AAAAAAANYWAY, Chicago won on a penalty in the 95th, and I continue to feel disgust for Blanco. He is increasingly lazy, sloppy, floppy and slow. He’ll fit right in with the rest of his Mexican squad next week. ZAP :O

MATCH HIGHLIGHT: Sacha Kljestan audibly telling Fire coach Denis Hamlett to “Shut the fuck up! Shut the fuck up! Fuck you, bitch!” Classy!

WHAT THE? is my weekly Premiership review column where I write about the crap I found interesting in the latest round of Prem games. This is about me, not you, so I don’t want to hear you bloody whine about it.

• Since the top of the Prem was decided last week, this week was a fight to stay up.

• Hull City, which got off to a fantastic start to the season, lost to Manchester United 0-1 but manages to stay in the top flight by one point.

• Middlesbrough lost to West Ham 1-2 which was the final nail in the coffin as they will play in the Championship next season.

• Newcastle had a rather sad game as an own goal by Duff and the resulting loss 0-1 to Aston Villa saw them relegated.

• Fulham lost to Everton 0-2 but managed to stay above Tottenham for the critical seventh place on the Prem table to play European ball next season.

• West Brom was relegated last week and tied Blackburn 0-0 in the final game of the season.

• Chelsea’s Anelka scored the most goals this season with 19, followed by Ronaldo with 18 and Gerrard at 16.

WHAT THE? is my weekly Premiership review column where I write about the crap I found interesting in the latest round of Prem games. This is about me, not you, so I don’t want to hear you bloody whine about it.

• Manchester United secured the Premier League title with a 0-0 draw with Arsenal.
  

• Fulham held on to the critical seventh position with a 1-0 win against Newcastle. Tottenham is only two points behind Fulham going into the last week.

• West Brom lost 0-2 against Liverpool to be the first confirmed relegated team.

• Going into the last round, Middlesbrough, Newcastle and Hull are all fighting for their Premiership lives.

The search for lost glory. The registration fees. The tragic team names. The championship t-shirts. The inflated egos. The weekend war. This is rec league soccer.

Rec league soccer rightfully attracts players with all levels of experience. It’s a perfect format for new players to get in and learn the game from seasoned vets. But sometimes, especially in the United States, players sign up without a hint of knowledge or respect for the sport. For many, it’s ingrained in youth: soccer is an easy sport for sissies. By fate, some of those kids grow up and find themselves on a rec league soccer field, usually to win points with the boss or a hot chick. And, gee whiz, a little exercise would be good!

The secret is, soccer (at all levels) is much more than a little exercise. There may not be the brutal contact found in American football or the raw muscle power of baseball, but soccer easily requires many multiple times the running of any other major team sport. It’s pretty much all running. This requires endurance and condition for which many aren’t prepared. I’ll share two personal stories of players who faced the consequences of underestimating the requirements a rec league soccer match, in the hope that you can take this knowledge and one day save a life. Seriously.

The Tale of Holy Shit He’s Not Breathing

While warming up for an outdoor game last summer, I noticed the current match had stopped and a group of people were standing over a guy flat on his back. This is not an unusual sight, as people twist ankles, smash knees, and cause general bodily mayhem pretty regularly. Plus, it was almost 90 degrees and heat exhaustion is common. But this was different… he looked young, in shape, and he was not moving.

The air of the situation got tense very quickly. I was 20 yards away but heard snippets of conversations in frantic tones. “Is he breathing?” “I don’t know.” “Go get help.” Within seconds his teammates sprinted off to summon help while others stayed behind and performed CPR. If you have never seen CPR in real life, it’s terrifying to watch. “I don’t think he has a pulse.” I felt like throwing up.

The ambulance showed up a few minutes later and I overheard from teammates that this guy had been playing vigorously and suddenly dropped limp, only sporadically regaining consciousness. His breathing and pulse were off-and-on. After a few moments on-site, they whisked him off to the hospital.

The next week I asked the facility organizers if they knew what happened to the guy. They told me that his heart was significantly damaged because it stopped (!) for a period of time and he would undergo surgery soon. Why? Instead of water, he had been drinking Red Bull. In layman’s terms, it was explained to me that the resulting electrolyte imbalance was so severe that his body shut off like a switch. Apparently he didn’t realize that the exertion required for playing soccer in such heat would require a lot of water (and temperance) to keep up. My guess is, he had a late night and needed a boost for the game. The boost led him to overwork a dehydrated body, and the result almost killed him.

The Tale of You Can’t Play Soccer if You Smoke

Years ago, I joined a team of all coworkers, but I hadn’t been at the job long enough to know much of anyone. At the first game, I recognized a guy for a reason that sent up a red flag or two: I see him everyday on my way into the office, smoking a cigarette by the door.

The starting whistle blew with this guy on the field. He seemed fine but subbed out literally one minute later. I went in for him, played ten minutes or so and came back to the bench. I saw him seated, clinging to consciousness, sucking in air, pale and covered in sweat. Moments later, he limped away to puke.

Not only did he not return to the field that day, but he never showed up to another game. The moral of the story is, if you smoke, you can play golf or pool. Only.

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There is a tiny nation in the world of soccer of which many of us are citizens: The Recreation League. Far from Old Trafford, papparazzi, and highlight reels, you’ll find me playing co-ed, open age group, in a middle tier division, in Columbus, Ohio. In the grand soccer scheme, my team hardly exists. There is no cup for us. We have no fans, no salary, no recognition, and no respect outside our microcosm. But what is inside the microcosm is what Rec Rules is about—a regular look inside the American recreation league culture.