Trinity’s winner excites, DCU thuds, and more: Monday Freedom Kicks
Happy Monday, y’all. It was a wild weekend of soccer and an absolutely exciting day yesterday at Audi Field, so we begin there:
Rodman scores game-winner in Washington Spirit 2-1 win against Portland Thorns
What an awesome match! Trinity Rodman returns and gets the game-winner against Portland. And she was emotional after the match…ain’t no one chopping onions this morning, those are happy tears.
DC United played Ethiopia in a friendly on Saturday. It did not go well.
Brazil beat Colombia in shootout in Women’s Copa America final thriller (Reuters)
An epic match in the Copa América final. Brazil ends up winning it in penalties, denying Leicy Santos and Colombia the trophy.
USWNT’s Ally Sentnor traded to Kansas City Current in NWSL blockbuster (PSW)
A bombshell on Friday as Ally Sentnor was traded to KC. That makes a great team even better.
Takeaways from Loudoun’s 3-2 loss to Tulsa
Loudoun’s skid continues. They haven’t won a match since June 14th.
DC United might be active in the transfer market, but it sounds like Pirani might be headed to Sweden if Mälmo comes correct on their offer.
Sources: Omari Glasgow Joining Loudoun on Loan (MIR97)
Loudoun could also be picking up reinforcements during the transfer window.
Son announces Tottenham departure as LAFC move nears (PSW)
Son Heung-min is likely headed to MLS and LAFC. But first, he said goodbye to Spurs in an emotional friendly in Seoul.
This was an interesting thing to see on the internets over the weekend:
Inter Miami says Lionel Messi muscle injury ‘minor’ (ESPN)
Once again, DC fans who paid a grip on tickets to the Inter Miami match are left to wait and see if Lionel Messi will actually make the trip. He hasn’t visited DC since he came to MLS.
Enjoy the day.
Croix’s assist on the Rodman goal was incredible, to the point where I absolutely didn’t suspect intent when I saw it live. On the replay, sure enough, she intently watched the progress to Rodman, and was triumphant even before it went in.
The level of skill, vision, confidence, and execution it took, wow. No current DC United player remotely had that in their locker, not to mean it.
Sublime.
(Who is DC United? Asking or a friend…..)
Today is the last day of Klich being on waivers!
Spirit roster: 20 national team members (current or recent) of 32 plus 2 under 23/20 national team members. Many on top flight WNT.
DC United roster: 6 national team members (current or recent) of 25. None on top flight though Benteke’s Belgium would have qualified in Golden Generation.
My advice to DP Commentariate: Make Spirit your primary rooting interest while praying for ownership change at DCU.
My fandom priorities: Spirit, USWNT, USMNT, Argentine MNT, DCU.
While I would love for DCU to be better, I’m certainly not upset that they don’t have more National Team players on the roster. With MLS not stopping for all FIFA windows, we’d be absolutely DECIMATED if we had 20 national team players on the roster at one time. While its cool to have some national team guys, I’d much rather be filled out with good level players that have no chance of playing for their national teams.
There’s an advantage to signing players from the powerhouse countries that will never make the grade for the national team in terms of profile.
That’s exactly what I’m getting at. It’s much better (at least in MLS) to have someone like a Lucho or Evander that are great players that will never see their respective national teams, rather than signing whoever the Evander/Lucho equivalent is for Uzbekistan or Latvia that will be gone for every single international window
The Estonian Messi was constantly missing…..
(I kid, I agree with you)
Solid “non-nationals” are key for success in MLS. There are plenty of them. We just don’t get them on our roster.
We also don’t get Mueller or Son. Any movement in in the transfer window? Move Pirani to Malmo for whatever you can get, because it just doesn’t matter
Indeed, The ultimate MLS player is someone like Diego Valeri or Evander, or even Christian Gomez. Able to dominate in MLS, but completely overlooked by their national team.
If you *are* to have national team regulars, they need to up your win percentage so much while they play that it’s worth missing them for about a quarter of the season during the busiest international years. We… don’t win with or without our guys (it’s just less embarrassing when they play).
I respect your position on this, but am a little hesitant to assume that new ownership automatically means an improved DC United. It definitely could. However, the pool of people and groups with the resources and interest in buying a team are somewhat limited. There is just as much of a chance that some sovereign wealth fund or oligarch purchases the team to launder their reputation. Or the person/people who purchase it the team do it as a vanity project and are chaotic and disruptive or maintain the status quo.
Oligarchs laundered Newcastle pretty well. Maintaining the status quo means there’s no downside. Getting a chaotic idiot would at least be click bait.
Levien is nice and affable person, but he has proven not to be a soccer executive (Swansea and DC United). I hope he finds a buyer.
At this point, it’s not a choice between new ownership or sticking with the current regime, it’s the life or death of the brand. This club needs new ownership to reawaken and get any forward momentum.
Maybe they would be oil powers or irresponsible, and maybe it would cause me to abandon the club permanently, but the club would at least live.
Looks like Donovan Pines has signed with a team in Austria
That sounds like fun. He has the depth of character and intelligence to make a go of it on many levels. I hope he has a great time. Austria is beautiful.
If Schnegg can make it there, so can Pines.
That was laugh out loud funny. But probably true.
Props Fischy, props!
Messi will not suit up against DCU. It would be managerial malpractice to have him do so. I hope I am wrong.
He just doesn’t want to come play in the swamp that DC is literally built on top of with our field conditions. Though it seems like the pitch at Buzzard Point is holding up better this year than it did last year.
Probably thinks Miami could beat us even with only 10 players for 90 minutes. And that wouldn’t be wrong.
Hell I think they could beat us with 9.
Speaking of 9, is Suarez healthy? He is a reasonable draw….
Well our players will need to watch out for his mouth in more ways than one.
Leicy Santos had a pretty poor penalty kick in the Copa América final, but before that she equalized with one of her classic free kick goals. I can’t wait to have that skill back with the Spirit
Video, if anyone would like to see it:https://bsky.app/profile/838carlisle.bsky.social/post/3lvhdrvbdzc25
I gave my tickets to a family member who is actually going to Ethiopia next weekend for a Capitol Hill kind of thingy. I’ll check in with him to get the scoop on the game, and whether or not he made any meaningful contacts (I would think so).
If you pull Benteke, this is likely the worst (bottom 5 for sure) DC United team in history. Pirani is replaceable, so move him for his sake. Malmo is a much better run operation.
Honestly, 3-0 loss to Ethiopia? The 1990’s DCU teams would have throttled them. (No disrespect to Ethiopia intended at all).
Only Hopkins, Kim, Murrell, Zouhir, and Kijima were from the “first” team while everybody else in the starting xi was an academy player.
Well, that explains much. It is not poor utilization to do that.
It’s not “poor utilization” unless you’re a DC United STM who got stuck with this game on their season ticket package, not at the ticket price you might expect to watch an Academy team.
It would be interesting to hear DCU STM’s discuss whether or not they got their money’s worth on Saturday. If not, does DCU ownership care in any way?
Agree, Fischy, point taken. I did get Celtic last year, which was cool. Bayern a bit back as well.
Like I said, I gave my tickets away.
It will be sad for me to leave after 30 years, but I cannot justify burning retirement money on this product anymore. I’ll hit up a few games, as tickets will be amply available. If it is sold out, great news.
Man, it takes a hell of a lot of apathy to have me make this move. It feels bizarre.
Adding onto what Will mentioned, by the end of the game I believe we only had 1 professional player on the field. The bigger issue to me is that this was clearly treated as a throwaway game on and off the field (though from what I heard the attendees made a good time of it).
It’s a total abuse of STMs to have this Ethiopia Cup. I found it impossible to get any info on the match until this morning’s Freedom Kicks. DCU ownership approach is to soak a declining STM for every dollar it can get. By contrast, Spirit works hard to expand fan base.
I hear you, David. I hope you are on the mend, by the way.
I mean, if DCU can get someone who CAN replace Pirani, that’s fine — but Pirani’s production, largely thanks to a recent hot streak, is pretty good. 3 goals scored or assisted every 5 (90 minutes) games isn’t bad.
DCU always thinks they can get better players for cheaper and the results are predictable.
Honestly, it really doesn’t matter one way or another. That’s telling.
For those who didn’t catch the game Friday night. In the final warmup match for the Women’s Rugby World Cup in England in a couple of weeks the US Women got dominated in the 2nd half and lost 42-10 to our northern neighbors. The US had a great opening 15 minutes of the game and punched Canada in the mouth with a try. The half would finish with a try for the Canadians right before halftime at 14-10 to Canada. In the first half the Canadians committed several penalties and turnovers keeping the US in the game. Then the 2nd half happened and right out of the gates Canada scored and never looked back. The US kept turning the ball over and Canada’s forwards dominated our forwards. The most obvious example of that is when Canada had a lineout near midfield and then established a rolling maul and rolled our defense back with that platform to deep within our own 22.
The US Women’s next game is the opening match at an apparently sold out Stadium of Light in Sunderland against hosts England who are heavily favored to win that match. To get out of their pool the US will need to be Australia and Samoa. They have never not made it out of their pool at the Women’s Rugby World Cup.
https://eagles.rugby/news/usa-womens-eagles-fall-behind-strong-second-half-from-canada-in-final-fixture-ahead-of-rugby-world-cup-202582
At the end of the linked article is the broadcast information for all 3 pool stage games for the US.
USA vs England August 22 2:30 PM EDT on Paramount+
USA vs Australia August 30 2:30 PM EDT on Paramount+
USA vs Samoa September 6 8:30 AM EDT on CBS and Paramount+
Quarterfinals begin on my birthday September 13.
2027 Men’s Rugby World Cup Qualifying updates