Subbing off the bench in the 76th minute against Belgium, the Colorado Rapid’s Jeff Larentowicz earned his second United States men’s national team cap. The U.S. National team played a 1 -0 defeat at King Baudouin Stadium in Brussels, Belgium on Tuesday. With only a little over fourteen minutes to evaluate his play, it was hard to truly rate his performance, but he stepped in and played a similar role as he does with the Rapids. Jeff plays as a defensive holding midfielder and is tasked with breaking up opposing attacks in our defensive half. This year for the Rapids, Larentowicz has seen career high numbers in goals scored (6) and has played in all 28 games so far. His six goals currently lead the Rapids tied with Caleb Folan and Conor Casey.

Larentowicz, who in my opinion, isn’t always the most exciting player to watch on the pitch is one of the most consistent players on our current Rapids roster and is well deserving of the U.S. national team call-up. It was great to see him get in the match in Belgium and earn valuable playing time against top talent in the world. With his recent national team training, he should come back to his club team, a little tired, but with a wealth of knowledge to pass along during the Rapid’s CONCACAF Champions League run. His style of play appears to be an important piece to Jurgen Klinsmann’s U.S. side but it also appears to be a very competitive position as well. Maurice Edu, Real Salt Lake’s Kyle Beckerman and Michael Bradley appear to be competing for this spot and all have more national team experience than Jeff. It still waits to be seen which players Klinsmann wants in his new system and he appears to be giving many an opportunity to earn their position in the new attack minded style of play. One thing is certain; his formation requires a central defensive midfielder and Larentowicz has earned his call-up. After seeing his second national team cap, it’s now up to him to show Klinsmann he deserves more minutes.

JMH

Whenever I hear a fellow countryman is heading back stateside, I get all excited. As Tommy Boy would say, “Hello there pretty little pet, I love you. And then I stroke it, and I pet it, and I massage it. Hehe I love it, I love my little naughty pet!” Now of course this is a professional kind of excitement but just trying to illustrate how my eager imagination works. As you might have read, United States men’s national team player, Benny Feilhaber, is coming to the MLS. For the last 3 seasons Feilhaber has been playing in the Danish leagues with Aarhus Gymnastikforening (don’t worry, I can’t say it either) as more of an attacking midfielder. After watching the Colorado Rapids last two matches, our depth at center midfield has been uncovered. Pablo Mastroeni isn’t getting any younger (he’s actually the second oldest on the team at 34) and I can’t help believe that we won’t get a few more knocks in our midfield this season.

Feilhaber is more of an attacking midfielder unlike our defensive midfielder, Jeff Larentowicz. I consider Pablo our best option for getting our forwards service from the midfield and since he has not played the last two matches, our dangerous forwards (any combination you choose) have been extremely quiet. Seeing how our team has developed since the offseason, I believe forward is our most talented position and our defense is even tighter as a core than they were last year. With Mastroeni at 34, Brian Mullan at 32 and Jamie Smith at 30, midfield seems like a position we need to starting looking at for the future as well as for our immediate needs.

So here comes Feilhaber, 26, knocking on the MLS door. He’s never played stateside, having gone to Germany in 2005 after his UCLA experience, and now potentially getting picked up by a team very close to home. Chivas USA has the top allocation ranking for returning US national team players and will most likely use their position to claim Feilhaber. They seem to be in the business of trading away USMNT players for draft picks, allocation money and for players closer to the demographic of their fanbase. Going back to my eager imagination, I’d like to see the Rapids make a trade offer for Feilhaber. Use the comment section below to describe your idea of a realistic package we could offer Chivas USA for Benny.

JMH

As an United States Men’s National team supporter, I don’t think I can cheer against Charlie Davies. Can’t wait to see him grace DSG Park tonight with DC United, but of course I’ll still be cheering for our Rapids.

In a night where neither Omar Cummings nor Conor Casey started, the Rapids came away from the Home Depot Center with a 1-0 victory over Chivas USA. This was the first time in 63 games that at least one of them did not start. Omar was on national team duty with the Reggae Boys and Conor has had a troubled calf muscle this week. The lone goal came in the 32nd minute from always hustling, Quincy Amarikwa, compliments to a through ball from Jamie Smith. When I often question the technical ability of Amarikwa, he proved me wrong with a cheeky chip over a sliding Zach Thornton and finishing in an open net.

The 2-0 start is the first time in Rapids history beginning a season with two victories; a good indication that last season was not a fluke. Paired with Quincy for the night was the newest acquisition of the Rapids, Caleb Folan. The big man did well for his first MLS game and gave us a superb option while Conor works back towards match fitness. Once again our midfield and defense were solid and earned their first shutout of the season.

Looking back at the match yesterday, it had a tough act to follow. The US Men’s National team had a game against Messi & Argentina in a sold out Meadowlands Stadium. I do love the MLS but watching the Rapids play Chivas USA was a little rough after watching Messi, 2010 FIFA Player of the Year, exhibit his magic on the same pitch as our Comeback Kids. Also, I’m probably not the first person to say it, but Chivas USA is not an exciting team to watch. They are probably the one team I can’t wait till the match is over. We’ve dominated them in recent memory and last night’s match marked the fourth straight Chivas shutout. However, our Boys in Burgundy came away with a road victory and as well as a historic start to the 2011 season.

Our boys clad in a fantastic red 3rd kit wore “Indivisible” embroidered on their sleeves, and American underdog strength in their hearts. We traded blows with perhaps the hottest country on earth in Argentina. Just under 80k fans watched our boys do us proud in one of the greatest friendlies I’ve seen in a long time.

Red Bull’s Juan Agudelo provided the equalizer, and this young sensations name will be on the lips of fans across America. He does one thing well, and that one thing is what you need from your forwards: he scores goals. His entrance in the 2nd half along electrified the team. It allowed Jozy to stop playing lone target striker (which he sucks at), and face goal (which he is excellent at). Timothy Chandler of FC Nurnberg got his first cap on his birthday, and looked a bit like Philip Lamm making runs up the wing.

Enjoy these fantastic highlights.

The World Cup in the US with Morgan Freeman’s voiceover. Dang that guys voice is cool, and this is a very well done video.

CRF hereby pays “honor” to the biggest footballing a$$hole in world football, Dutch midfielder Nigel De Jong. US Men’s National Team fans will remember how he “took care of the situation,” Mafia style, on March 4, 2010. His reckless tackle broke Stuart Holden’s ankle and ruined Holden’s season after a dream move to Bolton.

Some will say De Jong is an enforcer. No, Van Bommel is an enforcer. VB is an aggressive, wily veteran who comes close to “dirty” every game but almost always stays on the right side of the line.

De Jong is just plain dangerous, which is unfortunate as he is a gifted and physical defensive midfielder. He must’ve been disappointed in South Africa to leave so many ankles unbroken (though watching his body of work one can’t say he didn’t try). He did however leave his “imprint” on Xabi Alonso, who is too much of a gentleman to get up and headbutt him in the nose.

Nigel De Jong…congratulations for truly earning the title of World Football’s greatest a$$hole.

As we approach the end of the World Cup, one glaringly obvious conclusion must be drawn: having an elite league in one’s country does not equal national team success. The top 5 leagues in Europe (and arguably the world) are:

1. English Premier League
2. Spanish La Liga
3. German Bundesliga
4. Italian Serie A
5. French Ligue 1

The English, Italians, and French were all various forms of a disaster. The Germans & Spanish fought for the European crown in 2008, and are destined for a monumental clash tomorrow. 2 out of 5 is not a good rate, especially when you consider the success of impoverished nations like Uruguay, Paraguay, and Ghana.

The trajectory of American soccer is indisputably up. You might wish it was more steeply graded upwards, but upwards it is nonetheless. Major League Soccer continues to grow steadily if slowly, and US soccer interest (as evidenced by TV ratings) is burgeoning.

Ok so I used a little hyperbole in the title (@BMer916 I hear ya, I hear ya). The countries above are superpowers in both club and country. But the staggering wealth of the super leagues means the emphasis will follow the money. Inter Milan won the Champions League without a single Italian. The French really had no business being in the World Cup (handball!). Who is standing in line replace the talented, famous, but aging English midfielders? European leagues are moving towards stricter requirements for having nationals on your club team to combat this trend, but South American talent is being cultivated far better in European football than is national talent.

MLS may never be a top 5 league, though a top 10 league seems a reasonable proposition in the next decade. Nonetheless for the purposes of the growth of soccer, and the quality of the National Team…it doesn’t need to. Having an elite league does not equal success in the World Cup.

After Landon Donovan scored the winner against Algeria, everything goes hazy in my memory. I recall the smell of sweat, the feel of beer on my skin, and (true story) blood on my jersey. A moment I’ll never forget.

Where were you? What is the memory you’ll carry with you?

Landon just tagged this video on Facebook with the comments:

Not sure if you guys saw this but it brings tears to my eyes every time. Thank you all so much…we can’t do it without you guys. Believe

For the understatement of the week, ESPN is important to the US sports fan (and increasingly to the world). Good to see ol’ #10 in one of their genius “commercials.”