Stoppage time of the first leg of the Canadian Championship final between Vancouver and Toronto FC last night, Toronto leading 1-0:
File that one in Hassli’s growing collection of audacious goals, right next to this one.
Let Us Now Praise Leo Messi, Part XLVI
There’s not much left to say about the 24-year-old genius-in-residence at Barcelona, but the goalkeeper’s reaction on Goal No. 3 of yesterday’s five-goal outburst against Bayer Leverkusen does a pretty good job of summing him up.
Take a look at the keeper after he’s beaten by Messi’s casually brilliant chip for his third goal. We’re pretty sure the English translation for that is WTF:
Messi has 48 goals in 42 games this season, and 228 goals, 93 assists, and 18 trophies in his career. And again, he’s only 24.
Is he the best ever?
The current titleholder, Pelé, said the following when Le Monde asked him that question recently:
“When Messi has scored 1,283 goals and won three World Cups, then we will talk.
“People always ask me: ‘When is the new Pelé going to be born?’ Never. My father and mother closed down the factory.”
That is top-notch stuff from the legend. And he has a point. Messi’s heroics are fresh in the public’s mind and eyes, while Pelé’s case was stated decades ago. The public needs a reminder.
The one knock on Messi has been that he hasn’t done it on the international level, and there’s merit to the charge. But he did bag a hat-trick for Argentina on last Wednesday’s international fixture date, and he has at least six more years of his prime left.
Pelé’s title is safe for now, but maybe not for long.
Lionel Messi: Human Gyroscope
Thanks for the feedback on the inaugural, beta edition of Tracking Back, our podcast spinoff. We’re going to produce it every other week for the time being, and if all goes well and schedules allow, we’ll move to a weekly podcast.
One item we discussed in last week’s debut was the great Leo Messi and how he never dives. It’s true, and as we said on Tracking Back, it’s not just on principle that he always tries to stay on his feet after getting kicked, grabbed, hacked and hip-checked by defenders. He does it because his low center of gravity gives him superior balance and enables him to zip past, around and sometimes through opponents’ wild lunges.
Behold:
The game may be overpopulated by divers, floppers, and fakers, but Messi is not one of them. And if you had any lingering doubts that he is the best player on the planet, well, it’s hard to argue against the evidence on display above.
This Week in Gnarly: adidas Unveils a “Boot With A Brain”
This news actually broke a few weeks ago, but it’s worth catching up with: adidas has made a Beamon-esque leap forward in soccer technology with the miCoach SPEED_CELL (first tweak, btw, should be the name), a chip that fits in the sole of the company’s new adizero F-50 boot and can track the wearer’s 360-degree movement, capturing metrics such as speed, average speed (recorded every second), maximum speed (recorded every five seconds), the number of sprints, distance, distance at high intensity levels, steps, and step length.
Seven hours’ worth of these kinds of data can be stored in the device’s memory, and then transmitted wirelessly to a smartphone, tablet, PC, or Mac, where it can be organized visually (pie charts, bar graphs, etc.) for easy apprehension.
That is pretty badass, and there’s more: adidas will soon introduce a series of apps connected to the SPEED_CELL, including miCoach Soccer, which will allow players to apply their real-world performance stats to their own avatar in a soccer videogame.
Philadelphia 4, New England 4: Revs Collapse Like Cartoon Soufflé
New England took a 3-0 lead on Philadelphia after 25 minutes last night at PPL Park—and a 4-1 lead into the halftime break. But as they demonstrated in coughing up a two-goal second-half advantage over New York last month, no lead is safe with the 2011 Revolution.
After the Union’s Freddy Adu scored his first MLS goal since 2007 to make it 4-2 in the 54th minute, you started to get a certain feeling….
Sure enough, Sebastien Le Toux buried a penalty in the 80th minute and then, two minutes into stoppage time, struck a fantastic equalizer to make it 4-4.
This game was a crazy-quilt of highlights and errors.
In addition to his goal, Adu completed 93% of his passes (according to Opta Sports), new Revs signing and potential Name Hall of Famer Moncef Zerka opened his MLS account with a skillful header, Benny Feilhaber and Roger Torres scored sweet goals from just outside the box, and the Revs’ defense, as ESPN commentator Adrian Healey tweeted, was bagel soft.
Beyond all that—and unfortunately not included in the highlights below—both teams created golden chances to win it deep into stoppage time, after Le Toux’s equalizer, but neither could finish.
Here’s the clip:
It was an incredible fight-back by Philly, but they are still winless in seven games, with a big one coming up on Saturday against playoff contenders Portland. New England, whose playoff hopes are all but gone, return home to host FC Dallas on Saturday night.
Premier League Opening Day Matches In Doubt
Officials won’t make the decision until Thursday, but right now, it’s looking like the nine games scheduled for the weekend in London will have to be postponed due to rioting in the capital. Three of those matches are Premier League games, and six are Football League fixtures.
(The England–Holland friendly scheduled for Wednesday has already been canceled, and four Carling Cup matches have been postponed.)
It just so happens that the Premier League games—Tottenham vs Everton, Fulham vs Aston Villa, and Queens Park Rangers vs Bolton—all involve Americans.
But since the photo above is from Tottenham and since, according to The Telegraph, major games require 100 police officers for security, it looks like Tim Howard, Clint Dempsey, Brad Friedel and Stuart Holden (who is recovering from injury) will not open the Premier League season on time. The required policeman will almost certainly be needed elsewhere.
Earlier today, the Premier League and Football League issued a press release saying that there was “no reason to think any matches ouside of London will be affected,” but given the reports of unrest in Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester, and West Bromwich, that statement may be overtaken by events.
Again, an official announcement is expected on Thursday. For more on these developments, see here and here.
Let’s Check Today’s Temperature in Qatar, Shall We?
Just for smiles.
On our way into the office this morning, we overheard a gentleman talking about how he had just returned from a business trip to Qatar. (He actually used both of the pronunciations we’ve heard for the 2022 World Cup host nation—“Cutter” and “Kuh-TAR”—opting for the second one when his listener blanked on the first.)
He said, referrring to the current summer temperatures in NYC, “This is comfortable compared to where I was yesterday. Just got back from Qatar. It was 118 degrees.”
That’s right. One hundred eighteen degrees.
Let’s take a glimpse at the extended forecast for the capital, Doha.
Oh, looky, the heat wave is over: Thursday’s high is predicted at only 104—followed by 107 on Friday and 108 on Saturday.
Sarcasm aside, the mind balks at these numbers. There will be a double-digit dropoff from Tuesday’s scorcher—will people be able to tell? What we mean is, there’s a noticeable difference between, say, 94 degrees and 80 degrees. Does the same apply to 118 and 104? Or does the human body just categorize anything above 103 as “bloody effin hot?”
We’re not sure, and we wouldn’t especially want to find out.
In any case, we hope those robot clouds are coming along smoothly.
This Is Just Badass
This is out of our jurisdiction (and about a week old), but it makes for 16 seconds of excellent Friday-afternoon viewing, so we’re posting it.
Watch as a Swiss youth team player breaks new ground in penalty-taking technique:
We’re a little light on the Swiss lingo, but we think we can figure out what that spectator is shouting after the goal—and we agree.
Watching this Interview May Cause Dust Levels to Rise in Your Immediate Vicinity
New DC United striker Charlie Davies spoke to regional Washington network CSN following his sensational MLS debut on Saturday:
Davies entered the game in the 52nd minute and scored two goals to lead the Black-and-Red to a 3-1 win over Columbus in their home opener at RFK.
For a full recap of Major League Soccer’s opening weekend, check out our column over at the MLS site.
Highlights Reel: All About the Bike
Wayne Rooney’s fantastic (three-quarter) bicycle kick against Man City on Saturday may end up as goal of the year in the Premier League this season, not only for the quality of the strike, but also for its importance—it proved to be the game-winner in a Manchester derby with title implications.
(The EPL has successfully scrubbed it from most of the interwebs, but you can still see it here.)
As great as it was, though, it’s probably not even in the Top 10 for overhead-kick goals in the past two decades. A quick search by the Backpost I-Team turned up several bikes more impressive than Rooney’s self-described “best goal” of his career—including a couple from the unsung ranks of MLS.
Let’s take a look, in ascending order of brilliance:
5. Taylor Twellman, New England Revolution, 2007
Sandwiched between two defenders, Twellman would have received a high-kick call (and possible booking) from the ref if he hadn’t punched the ball into the back of the net.
4. Ronaldinho, Barcelona, 2008
With a defender to his left and one directly on his back, he loops it over the latter and—golazo!
3. Marcelo Balboa, Colorado Rapids, 2000
MLS goal of the year that season, naturally, and a strong contender for top goal in league history.
2. Trevor Sinclair, Queens Park Rangers, 1997
Pfffft. What?! Top of the box, man tight on his back, this one would top our list if not for …
1. Rivaldo, Barcelona, 2001
Forget bicycle kicks, this might get our vote for greatest goal of any kind, period. You heard the announcer: “…completes the hat-trick, a minute from time” to give Barca a 3-2 win over Valencia, send them to the Champions League, and claim the La Liga scoring title with his 23rd goal of the season.
Add that importance to the off-the-charts skill, and this one is tough to beat.
*Amusing footnote to Rivaldo goal: He’s currently 38, and played the past two seasons in Uzbekistan (really) after signing what he termed an “extremely tempting contract offer.”
Bonus clips!
Marcelo Balboa, United States, 1994 World Cup [“Missed it by that much!” says Tony Meola]:
Dwayne De Rosario, San Jose Earthquakes, 2004
Two words: De. Ro.
That’s our list (nothing against Rooney’s great goal of course). Care to dispute it? Know of any better ones? Let us know in the comments.
