You as an MLSR reader are fairly intelligent, well informed and aware that there are those who do not like us for one reason or another.

Today we received an email from the guy who runs the "Keepin' it Real" Real Salt Lake fan site. In the series of emails he alleges that we have violated his copyright for posting the photo someone emailed us of fans at RSL's last game at Rice-Eccels Stadium. Click to continue reading...

One of my least favorite subjects- aside from ethnic cleansing, and life threatning diseases- is Lyon's resident brat, Frederico Chaves Guedes Fred. Fred recently gave an interview in French on OL's website. Since they didn't offer an English translation- and annoyingly, OL doesn't offers translations for alot of their articles- I thought I'd share a verbatim of the interview.

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So Michael Essien is out for six months. Chelsea staff: Why don't we just sit him for the rest of the season to make sure he's healhty. Anyway, rumors are floating around that the Blues are looking to ink a short-term replacement for the Ghanaian dynamo. A few names are being mentioned. The first is Essien's teammate with Ghana, 27-year-old free agent Stephen Appiah.

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Robinho wants out at Real Madrid. If you didn't think he was serious before, you should now.

The Brazilian held his own new conference seriously? today to publicly reveal his desire to join Chelsea.

"The situation has not changed," Robinho said. "I want to leave Real and play for Chelsea.

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(Summary is not available.) Click to continue reading...

ESPN here, and here is an AFP article with Rivaldo asking the fans' forgiveness but saying, esstially, money talks, bullsh-t walks... Goal.com coverage here, and here the British paper the Daily Mail rightly points out the irony in previously passing up stings at Tottenham and Bolton only to end up at that footballing mecca knows as Uzbekistan. Click to continue reading...

Poor Andriy Shevchenko. His London nightmare is almost over for a season at least.

Various reports suggest Chelsea and AC MIlan are "close" to agreeing deal that would send the fleeting Ukranian back to his old home on a one-year loan.

"Shevchenko in the Rossoneri shirt? There really isn't much more to be done," Milan sporting director Silvano Ramaccioni told Radio Goal.

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Since the news and rumors linking Oguchi Onyewu came out over the weekend, I've had my feelers out (and been scouring the Italian and French papers piling on my desk) to confirm them both -to no avail.

The first report linking Onyewu to Lazio came out at about 1PM (Western Europe time) on Sunday by the Lyon, France branch of Eurosport and we all did our share of speculation. Click to continue reading...

A few week's ago at an RBNY match I had a convo in the stands with the guy next to me about some hypothetical trades related to some of the current transfer rumors. The question was raised as to who would be a bigger loss for the team if they were to move on: Jeff Parke or Seth Stammler.

Without going into details of the seemingly endless beer-fueled debate, it was decided that while Jeff Parke is the heart of the clubs flawed defense and an all-around bad-ass it's Stammler and his versatility that would hurt the most. Click to continue reading...

Damn y'all. It only took one week of EJ not dressing for Fulham for the transfer rumors to take flight. I have no idea how legit the talk may be, but they say that Cardiff --having lost out on an earlier attempt to sign an American striker familiar with Pizza Hit Park-- wants to take possession of the Grown Ass Man. Click to continue reading...

OK.  This is starting to get ridiculous.  Kenny Cooper is the topic of numerous transfer rumors and now tops the MLS Golden Boot standings with 13 goals in 19 appearances that's 5 more than Brian Ching and 13 more than Eddie Johnson since his move to Fulham.  It's silly (although not surprising) that Cooper hasn't been [. Click to continue reading...

Didn't get much deeper than Arsenal on today's transfer rumors. A steady dose of the Olympics has limited my time even more so than usual. With a season preview in the works, I'll do my best to keep us updated... Click to continue reading...

Just received this link to Max Zeger's article on the possible, but sounding more probably, trade.

And I know that Benny Feilhaber's looking to come back to the States as well.

Here's a piece of Zeger's post:

Alexi Lalas has been trying to ship Carlos Ruiz somewhere for a while now.

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"Further to media reports, Chelsea Football Club can confirm we have made an offer to Real Madrid today (Thursday, August 7) for the transfer of Robinho."

Says a statement on the official Chelsea FC website. Short and sweet, eh? This ordeal, however, is certain to be anything but.

So we finally lodged a bid for the pint-sized Brazilian so true to Uncle Phil's heart.

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At least he is according to the Insider. According to two sources close to the club, D.C. United is in negotiations with goalkeeper Louis Crayton, who has played for eight Swiss clubs over the last 11 years and made 36 Liberian national team appearances. A deal "is not final yet," one source said. According to the big W, [. Click to continue reading...

From the Insider: *Three sources tell me this morning that D.C. United is in the final stages of completing a deal with a foreign goalkeeper. I have no other details to share at the moment, other than one person saying that the player's nationality "will surprise you." I am going to take a guess and say that [. Click to continue reading...

The endless transfer rumors do my head in. Honestly, haven't they gotten out of hand the past few years? From Zinedine Zidane and David Beckham's hilarious annoyance of a few years ago to Cristiano Ronaldo's supposed slavery this summer, haven't we had enough? (Common thread here? Real Madrid ... hmm .

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I am so sick of the Ronaldo saga.Will he leave Manchester United or will he remain? The saga is playing itself out in the public eye only in that it serves the agents and some members of the clubs. It is the part of Sports that makes me thirst for amateur football only.To go to a local field and watch human beings who play only with a dream and allot of hope. Click to continue reading...

And that is why we are 0-3-3 in the last six games.

That's my theory, and I'm sticking to it.

In teaching theory, "Stephen Krashen offers three ‘affective variables' that have been identified as being related to language-acquisition : these are ‘motivation', ‘self-confidence' and ‘anxiety'.

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Well, we got a new left back.  Details here. From the sounds of it, Juanfran will be our first choice left back, which means Arruarbarrena's days are numbered (since a team like AEK can't afford 800,000 a year for a back-up left back). Click to continue reading...

Okay, I'm glancing at the forums right under transfer rumors, and I see "Thierry Henry: F -... Click to continue reading...

The latest reports have Papastathopoulos, the 20 year old rising star, moving to Genoa (10th in Serie A). This is hardly surprising as he has been rumored to be moving to a bigger club for more than a year now. More surprising is the news that Kyrgiakos is set to be his replacement. Kygriakos is pure [. Click to continue reading...

A couple of weeks ago, The Offside got an email request for help in figuring out transfer rumors. Could we please offer up a list of both legitimate and illegitimate sites so readers can figure out for themselves how likely a rumor is to be true? I'm afraid we can't do that for a couple [...] Click to continue reading...

By ISIphotos.com

Good morning folks. It was a very interesting day here at the All-Star festivities. While several players had yet to arrive, there was still enough interviews to do and enough information to uncover.

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What can you say about pre-season friendlies? Other than nothing, really. It's hard to interpret them as anything. I remember reading someone's opinion on the German team's friendlies before the Euro- if they'd won their game easily, that would be a cause for worry because it means they're not working hard enough in training.

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Don't worry, the weekend recaps are coming soon (probably in the morning). But I wanted to knock out some of the transfer rumors that are happening right now around Major League Soccer. Today's big rumor takes place here in the Big D. FC Dallas is said to be looking into signing Argentine striker Ariel Ortega. Click to continue reading...

Chelsea set to land Kaka for record £80m
· Negotiations with Milan at an advanced stage
· World player of the year keen on move to London

That's how the Guardian is prosing it out.   Now I'll open this trash up for discussion.

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"I think Claude has this kind of gift - he's been the best player in the team for years but people just don't notice him, don't notice what he does. But you ask anyone at Real Madrid during the years we were talking about and they will tell you he was the best player at Real. We all knew, the players all knew he was the most important.

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Sigh.

We all knew this was coming, right?

I've been expecting this days with about the same emotions I felt when I was getting ready to get my wisdom teeth out. It had to be done, it was going to hurt, and I'd probably feel better once I recovered.

According to SoccerInsider, who know all, Abel Xavier has been cut.

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While I could write about the Samuel Eto'o transfer rumors (yawn) or the possibility of Luis Aragones replacing Unai Emery as head coach (whatever ...), I thought this was infinitely more interesting ...

According to Setanta Sports, Valencia's Mestalla is Europe's noisiest stadium.

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Does anyone want to explain this whole Robinho ordeal to me? Seriously, I've got no idea what's going on.

Just a day ago, the pint-sized Brazilian was quoted in an array out media outlets saying: "I hope to remain at Real Madrid this year. Now I am only thinking about Madrid. I am not prepared to enter into the operation to sign Cristiano"

Scratch that.

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Jmayers at The Beautiful Game blog has asked an interesting question: Am I the only one tired of Arshavin?

He goes on to say: "This guy is getting so many headlines and I don't think he deserves them. It's not necessarily his fault -- our infatuation [with] transfer rumors probably is -- but with this guy I'm getting tired of it. Click to continue reading...

Now don't get me wrong. I loved watching this guy play at Euros.

His attacking, no-fear style of play was one of the joys of the tournament.

But all this transfer drama is getting ridiculous. Every single potential player in this move is overvaluing the guy: his team, his suitors, himself. Click to continue reading...

There's plenty to report on in today's roundup, so without giving you much of an intro, I'll get right to the good stuff. Enjoy! "Transfer Rumors (14 July 08): Manchester City make offer for Ronaldinho, Berbatov out, Santa Cruz in at Tottenham, Shevchenko to Sampdoria, and more" was originally published at Soccerlens. Click to continue reading...

It sure seems that way.

According to the Guardian, the Milan club are prepared to offer £15 million plus yes, plus Adriano. Are you kidding me? This rumor just reeks of nonsense.

However, it could be true right? We all know The Ordinary One is desperate to land Lampard.

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