On the last podcast, I said that, with the redesign of the SE site, there would be a change to this blog. After much deliberation, I've decided to move the blogging to a new site and a new domain. This will allow me to post more often and cover the entire soccer world, not just DC United.

Please point your browsers to my new site, Booked For Dissent.

In case you haven't heard, the SE website has been re-designed, and the SEP blog is now fully integrated into it. For the new episode, go here.

Some interesting movement this week:

Team G W L D Pts PPG
NER 22 11 5 6 39 1.77
DCU 19 10 6 3 33 1.74
FCD 21 11 7 3 36 1.71
HOU 22 11 7 4 37 1.68
CHV 18 9 6 3 30 1.67
NYRB 20 10 7 3 33 1.65
KCW 20 8 7 5 29 1.45
CLB 21 6 7 8 26 1.24
---
CHI 19 6 8 5 23 1.

It's been a while since I've shown my usual contempt for Columbus. I've said plenty of times that I have grudging respect for Sigi Schmid, because he gets results without playing anything resembling attractive soccer, and Columbus did that for years before he even got there. But last night's game showed the difference between the two teams: quality forwards who can pounce on mistakes.

Team G W L D Pts PPG
FCD 20 11 6 3 36 1.80
NER 20 10 4 6 36 1.80
DCU 18 9 6 3 30 1.67
HOU 21 10 7 4 34 1.62
CHV 17 8 6 3 27 1.59
NYRB 19 9 7 3 30 1.58
KCW 19 8 6 5 29 1.53
CLB 20 6 6 8 26 1.30
---
COL 21 6 9 6 24 1.14
CHI 18 5 8 5 20 1.11
TFC 20 5 10 5 20 1.

Great post by Caps owner Ted Leonsis on his blog today, in which he rails against SportsTalk 980 for their attitude towards Thursday's game.

They made fun of the regular attendance of DC United which averages about 19,000 per game. They questioned whether soccer would make it in America. They basically parroted every cliché about soccer and MLS that we have heard through the years.

This one's longer than usual because the circus brought in so much more media – Doug Hicks said they issued 325 credentials for the game – that there were more questions to be asked. Naturally, they mostly had to do with Beckham. I didn't really want to talk about that; my show covers 4-time MLS Cup Champions DC United. I didn't stay for the Galaxy press conference so that I could talk to the DC players, but I left all the quotes about him from the other reporters in their in case you're interested, and Eric, Aaron and I do get into a lot of that in our discussion of the game.

Some interesting developments this week...

Team G W L D Pts PPG
FCD 19 10 6 3 33 1.74
NER 19 9 4 6 33 1.74
HOU 20 10 6 4 34 1.70
CHV 17 8 6 3 27 1.59
DCU 17 8 6 3 27 1.59
KCW 19 8 6 5 29 1.53
NYRB 18 8 7 3 27 1.50
CLB 19 6 5 8 26 1.37
----
CHI 18 5 8 5 20 1.

Best performance of the year? I'd say so. In all of our other dominating performances (NY, Colorado, Chicago), we were at home facing teams either missing players and/or going through a bad spell. Here, we were on the road against the conference leaders, who hadn't lost in five games, and outplayed them to a man. Getting the shutout, not even allowing a shot on goal in the second half, showed that the defense kept its focus against a team that makes you pay if you don't.

By now I'm sure you've seen the news that Manchester United signed a 9-year old whose video has been up on YouTube. Here's the now-famous clip.

Somehow, I don't see them making an offer to former United player Shawn Kuykendall any time soon...

I don't have enough material for a podcast to deal with tonight's match, so I'm going to cover the Houston match on the podcast following the New England game on Sunday.

How many times will they keep doing this? Today it was announced that the US will face Mexico at the Azteca on September 9 at 4:00. While I think it's great to schedule a friendly in the Azteca, it's at the same time that the United-Revolution game is taking place.

Just to show the levels of stupidity, the US game will be shown on Univision, who own Telefutura, who are broadcasting the United game!

OK, I got away from this for a week, but I'm back, so here's how the true MLS table looks right now:

Team G W L D Pts PPGHOU 19 10 5 4 34 1.79
NER 17 8 3 6 30 1.76
FCD 18 9 6 3 30 1.67
KCW 18 8 5 5 29 1.61
CHV 17 8 6 3 27 1.59
DCU 16 7 6 3 24 1.50
NYRB 18 8 7 3 27 1.50
CLB 18 6 5 7 25 1.

Even though America never looked like they could spell goal if you spotted them the g, o and l, I would have preferred to see United open up on them in that 10-minute stretch after the red card instead of passing the ball around. As good as we played, we need to be more deadly in front of goal if we're going to make something of this year.

This is a game we should have won. Monaracos were not a very good team, and we should have put them away early. Now we've got two difficult games ahead of us in order to advance, and, to be honest, I don't know if we have the team to do it.

As always, you can download the show (15:30, 14.1 MB) by right-clicking here and selecting "Save Target As.