USMNT win, Spirit players in Best XI, and more: Tuesday Freedom Kicks
Happy Tuesday! It’s a very exciting week for women’s soccer, with the NWSL Championship coming up on Saturday and end-of-year awards (plus National Team call-ups) being announced throughout the week.
Three takeaways as USMNT hammers Jamaica to advance in Nations League (Pro Soccer Wire)
The second half was a little sloppy, but the US men put in a strong performance against Jamaica last night for a 5-2 tally overall in the quarterfinal series.
NWSL Announces Winners of 2024 NWSL Best XI Awards, presented by Amazon Prime (NWSL)
Five Washington Spirit players were voted onto the Best XI first and second teams for the 2024 NWSL season. Croix Bethune, Casey Krueger, and Trinity Rodman made the first team, while Hal Hershfelt and Tara McKeown are on the second.
USWNT November roster announced for away friendlies against England and the Netherlands (SSFC)
Two of those players also made the latest USWNT roster: Hal Hershfelt and Casey Krueger will join a roster full of newbies for two matches in Europe later this year. Lily Yohannes will be there and potentially playing against her near-team, The Netherlands. Meanwhile, Triple Espresso (Trinity Rodman, Sophia Smith, and Mal Swanson) have been given this camp off to rest and recover from injury, according to Emma Hayes.
2025 US Open Cup Qualifying: Mike Akinkoye’s late winner sends Virginia Dream to first USOC (TheCup.US)
Virginia Dream qualified for their first Open Cup after beating Aegean Hawks FC this weekend with Bill Hamid in goal!
I wasn’t able to find a lot of information on this (or get the Facebook post to embed here), but it looks like there was some kind of unofficial D.C. United legends game on Sunday. Team photo here: https://www.facebook.com/share/p/15Wnc1J26o/?mibextid=WC7FNe
Some offseason moves for Loudoun United: Kalil ElMedkhar and Keegan Hughes will not be returning next year. ElMedkhar, who scored six goals and made four assists for Loudoun this year, will be joining FC Tulsa. Defender Hughes will be returning to Columbus Crew.
FIFA’s lowest-ranked team San Marino promoted to Nations League C (ESPN)
San Marino did it again! Their second win (ever)!
Several things from the Spirit’s semifinal win over the Bats (BTVC)
Because I want to keep reliving this game, here’s André Carlisle with the highlights.
No mid-week games to share today. Have a good week, everyone!
Five names in the Best XI (first and second teams), that’s quite a statement.
I see Hamid, CP13, De Ro, but I unfortunately don’t recognize the others off the bat in the FB post. Anyone else got ids?
Marco, Jaime and Fred are there. And if I’m not mistaken, Bobby Convey.
And Santino, of course. Perhaps Ronald Cerritos, though I don’t remember him being a legend.
He was a legend in his own mind.
It’s official: Croix Bethune is ROTY. Congrats Croix!
The MLR regular season dropped today. Old Glory DC will continue to play home games at the MD Soccerplex.
Eastern Conference (6 teams)
Western Conference (5 teams, Dallas Jackals folded during the offseason)
Details about how the schedule was generated (from MLR Facebook page)
16 games (8 home, 8 away)
Western Conference (8 in-conference matches, 8 cross-conference matches)
Eastern Conference (8-10 in-conference matches, 6-8 cross-conference matches)
Playoffs (4 teams per conference) Conference Semifinal => Conference Final => MLR Championship
2/15 2000 @ Miami Sharks
3/1 1600 San Diego Legion
3/8 1600 Anthem Rugby Carolina
3/15 1300 @ Chicago Hounds
3/22 1700 New England Free Jacks (Defending MLR Champs, and the team that has knocked OGDC out of the playoffs now for 2 seasons running)
3/29 2200 @ Rugby LA
4/05 1700 Seattle Seawolves
4/12 1900 @ NOLA Gold
4/19 1700 Miami Sharks
4/26 2000 @ Houston Sabercats
5/4 1400 Utah Warriors
5/13 TBD NOLA Gold
5/18 1900 @ Anthem Rugby Carolina
5/24 1700 @ New England Free Jacks
5/31 1800 Rugby LA
6/7 2200 @ San Diego Legion
https://oldglorydc.com/2025-major-league-rugby-schedule-announced/
I really wish there was a way to get Old Glory to play in Audi.
They can’t put enough butts in seats for it be financially viable for what Levein & co would probably charge them. Financial/owner issues has been the reason for a lot of MLR teams folding.
Tom Bogert is reporting that Tata Martino is out at Miami for “personal reasons.” It’s possible he could go back to Atlanta with their coaching vacancy, but hard to see how that’s a better fit than coaching Messi & Friends. Jim Curtin should have some pretty interesting interviews.
I would bet that wouldn’t happen unless Messi signed off on it.
Small update from Goff on DCU targets: The team is currently talking to goalkeepers Tim Melia (from SKC) and Jimmy Maurer (from Dallas). International goalies are also being considered. Team is apparently prioritizing goalies and center backs currently (which make sense given the state of those two positions)
Melia is 38 I believe. Great GK in his prime but KC has let him go so I think he’s more interested in us (starting job available) than we are in him. Maurer is also out of contract with Dallas. The rumor was that he was going to retire after 2024 and move in to the front office. He’s 36 so again, not a long-time solution.
Yeah, I’m not very excited about either of those as a primary goalkeeper. Melia has a great track record, and is excellent on PKs, but he is 38 and made about as much as Bono and Miller combined last year. He’s giving off some David Ousted vibes to me. I’m more curious about who the international goalkeepers are. There’s been some top keepers, like Roman Burki, Kahlina, Paes, and Lloris for some examples that have come through over the last few years. If we can play in that ballpark, that will be good.
I also don’t think anything like this will happen, but Bill Hamid is still out there, training and getting games with lower level teams…
I would really hope we can find better candidates than Melia or Maurer. A team that’s not going to rely on either one of them to be superman would probably be fine with having an older GK that organizes the defense and positions themselves well. Our GK needs to be very athletic and good on the ball. They’re going to be very busy in wise open spaces.
https://www.dcunited.com/news/d-c-united-signs-goalkeeper-jordan-farr-from-the-tampa-bay-rowdies?fbclid=IwY2xjawGrA01leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHRJoWYP0eSS-b_Fs-ZtMB8QMd9WyhT30KrWTstdT2jKjthdDJvTR-4pnJQ_aem_gyV7WVi3NHKaJdYJjRD7Lw
Jordan Farr of the Tampa Bay Rowdies has been signed to a 2 year deal with an option for a 3rd.
San Diego Legion are leaving Snapdragon Stadium to return to their original home of Torero Stadium at the University of San Diego. Rugby LA will be playing at UCLA’s soccer stadium Wallis Annenberg Stadium.
https://www.americasrugbynews.com/2024/11/19/san-diego-returns-to-torero-stadium-la-to-play-at-ucla/
For the best. Snapdragon field is complete crap for everything.