Good evening all. I don’t really have much too add, except that I am glad that Arsenal finally loosened their purse strings a little.
Feel free to share what’s on your mind. Some suggested topics:
- Is Hope Solo’s punishment too harsh?
- Thoughts on the transfer market.
- Champion’s League Draw.
Have at it!
Les Bonnes Femmes
My three favorite clubs are PSG (Because the greatest city in the world deserves a great football club), FC Basel because my parents used to live there and my father still does six months of the year. (Works for Novartis, sort of. It’s complicated.) And, I like Everton … because I don’t know why.
Anyway, you can see where I’m going with this: My work is dominated by Arsenal supporters, so I’m very excited about the draw yesterday. I’d love for Basel and PSG to break from Group A. (And, there is a Bulgarian dude at work who supports Ludogarets, as well. It’s gonna be fun.)
raven
Is there a game on?
raven
@Les Bonnes Femmes: You need to skip the abbreviations please.
hovercraft
No, she deserved to have the book thrown at her.
Cacti
Hope Solo’s punishment isn’t harsh enough.
Randinho
@raven: No, just someone asked me to do an open thread on Fridays so I am.
Cacti
@raven:
FC in any team’s name means Football Club.
PSG is Paris St. Germain.
redshirt
Frozen in carbonite is still better than death, so no.
minzo
Solo’s punishment is definitely harsh. What she said was stupid, but a six month suspension seems ludicrously disproportionate.
Les Bonnes Femmes
@Cacti: Thanks.
grrljock
A 6-month suspension and national team (though not from NWSL team) for just the comments would be too harsh. But this punishment applies retroactively to her other poor choices. It seems that Solo has embarrassed people who stood up for her one too many time. Just too bad. I’m just puzzled why Jill Ellis didn’t give either Naeher or Harris any playing time in the pre-Olympic friendlies, given ample red flags from Solo.
Bill
Only the overwhelming buffoonery of Ryan Lochte prevented Hope Solo from being the most classless athlete at the games.
cmorenc
@Randinho:
The answer is obvious from when it expires: in six months, i.e. February 2017. Now let’s see…what critical competitions will the USWNT engage in between now and then? Can’t really think of any….and there’s your answer.
Meanwhile, Solo still has a paying gig with the WSL’s Seattle Reign. The real threat to Solo’s future is that she is clearly far along into the back half of her playing career, and her suspension gives younger competitors for her GK position on the USWNT a clear opportunity to prove themselves worthy of a chance at the starting job, with the bonus credential of not so often being a PITA prima dona or wild card in her personal life, as Solo has sometimes been. If that happens, it’s too bad that Solo couldn’t have retired at a more graceful time of her own choosing, such as after the 2019 Women’s World Cup, but the upside is that if the USWNT decide this is a good opportunity to choose and install her replacement, she won’t have the indignity of having been beaten out while still actively on the team’s roster. OK, so “graceful” isn’t exactly a word that leaps to mind in describing Solo’s personality, as opposed to her GK skills. Although among the reasons the USWNT lost to Sweden is because Solo was suddenly afflicted with “hands of Clod” trying fluffing what should have been an only modestly more difficult than routine save that resulted in Sweden’s one goal.
Randinho
@cmorenc: US Soccer has also terminated her contract.
Adam L Silverman
@cmorenc: Most of her WSL salary is paid by US Soccer. So the suspension and termination from that, prevent her from basically being paid.
r€nato
my team is AC Fiorentina… They got a little embarrassed last week in their initial match of the campionato, losing at San Siro to Juve 1-2. (No, losing to Juve isn’t embarrassing; but the Bianconeri pretty much dominated them defensively.) This week they are at home vs Chievo, against whom they should have little difficulty.
I seem to always be cursed to follow teams that, the best they will ever do, is to almost-but-not-quite win it all…
jon
Solo’s suspension is certainly deserved. The length seems long, but she has priors (to use sentencing lingo.) I will miss her candid assholishness, but I’m guessing her team won’t.
She’ll never be back, unless the new keeper plays like a Red Sox lowlight reel. Probably even then.
raven
@Cacti: Thanks!
Paul in KY
I would say that because Ms. Solo is a repeat offender, in being a jerkwad & this was the Olympics, I’m OK with the suspension. Sure she wouldn’t have gotten that if this was her 1st offense.
Les Bonnes Femmes
@cmorenc: Well, that’s what makes the suspension a little wimpy to me. They were in no way going to suspend her during last year’s World Cup, or for the Olympics this year. It’s like: Hope’s fine as long as we’re winning!
But, as for the payment inequality, the USWNT is absolutely correct, and maybe a strike might sound a blow for improvement in that regard.
r€nato
@Les Bonnes Femmes:
Welcome to the world of sports. You might find Division I collegiate football a bit shocking in this respect…
The Ancient Randonneur
Solo needs to get into rehab and some sort of counseling. She’s married to a guy with a history of violence against women. If she doesn’t get help immediately I predict additional legal problems during her suspension.
philadelphialawyer
Way too harsh. I think it is unfair because it is backhanded punishment for other things that Solo has done. And because she is a woman. A male athlete making the same statement she made would not have been punished at all. Frankly, I think it is ridiculous that a governing body can suspend players and deny them their livelihood merely because they criticized the match tactics of an opposing team. If there is any kind of appeal process, I hope she uses it.
As for the game v Sweden, one reason the US lost is because Solo’s teammate completely missed a PK. Solo actually saved a PK during the shootout. Another reason the US lost is because, just as Solo said, the Swedes played a chicken shit, defensive, cynical, negative, and yes, cowardly game.
encephalopath
I have no problem with Solo’s statements. Sweden played a bunkered, defense and defense only strategy from beginning to end. She’s pissed off because it worked.
It was an impolitic thing to say and the team is right to scold her for it. But the idea that the team has to have total messaging control over everything the players say is absurd. If they don’t like what players might say, don’t let them do post game interviews. Otherwise suck it up.
Fining and suspending her for speaking her mind 10 minutes after the game is done is just stupid. Make her go out and qualify her statement later if you don’t like. It’s not like the left a profanity laced voice mail message for Pia Sundhage or something.
Les Bonnes Femmes
@r€nato: Yes, indeed.
Temporarily Max McGee (Soon Enough to Be Andy K Again)
@philadelphialawyer:
She should have never been allowed back on the team after she and hubby “borrowed” the USWNST’s van, got shitfaced and arrested for resisting arrest (and hubby for a DUI) in 2014.
Roger Moore
@Temporarily Max McGee (Soon Enough to Be Andy K Again):
Unfortunately, it looks like one aspect of equality is that elite women athletes are now being given the same lax treatment that elite men have long been given. If you can help your team win, they’ll overlook all kinds of wrongdoing.
Amir Khalidolet
@Temporarily Max McGee (Soon Enough to Be Andy K Again):
I agree. That drunken joyride in a team vehicle would be grounds enough for expulsion from the national team. In fact, I’m a little surprised they didn’t ban Solo then.
As for the First-Amendment argument re her remarks about Sweden, I don’t think anyone is disputing her right to say those things. But her words were disrespectful and unsporting, and they offended and embarrassed the national federation and her teammates. And this wasn’t the first time she’d done that. I can’t conclude that she was punished too harshly.
Transfer market: Liverpool needs decent central defenders and a better goalkeeper than Mignolet. I hear Joe Hart is available.
UEFA Champions League: Liverpool had better qualify for next season, or I shall be displeased.
Amir Khalid
My comment awaits moderation because for some reason my name showed up as Amir Khalidolet. Can someone please correct my name, and/or release me?
humboldtblue
My focus certainly won’t be on Europe this year because the Reds and Klopp don’t play but it was just announced that Liverpool have made an $11 million dollar bid for Pulisic at Dortmund and USMNT.
Also, with this the 5th season I’ve followed Liverpool as an actual fan and former sportswriter there is nothing in American sports that matches the absurd rumor mill of transfer season. Also, listening to Reds’ fans bitch about Klopp after 10 months in charge is hilarious.
A Guardian writer wrote an interesting piece the other day about how the pressure on managers in the PL (they got rid of a primary sponsor and it won’t return, they want a “clean” league name like NFL or NBA so from now on it’s the PL) to win and win immediately is such a shift from even 25 years ago. It took Shankly six seasons to keep Liverpool in the old first division, SAF was in his 7th season and looking at getting fired when he won his first major trophy at Man United it’s yet another symptom of the quickly-changing face of “club” football in England. What used to be parochial and local has become the biggest sporting money-maker on the planet and it’s become not only the deepest league talent-wise (PL hosts more international team members on its rosters than any other Euro league, by far) but the target of investors from all over the world particularly China.
It’s going to be a helluva a season with the Mancs, Spurs, Chelsea, Leicester and maybe even the Reds and Hammers making a push for top 4 or even a league crown. Pep vs. Klopp vs. Pochettino vs. Conte (he’s gonna be scary when he gets that Chelsea talent straightened out) vs. Mourinho is just drama waiting to happen.
Uncle Omar
Looking at the draw…how come Celtic always gets Barca (at least when Celtic makes it past qualifying?) Man City and Barca, they should have just have thrown in Bayern Munich so that Hoops would have to go through all of Pep’s clubs.
burnspbesq
@minzo:
Yes, I agree–but it’s also mostly meaningless. The US women don’t have a meaningful match for at least 18 months. It’s a good opportunity to blood potential replacements; Solo will be 38 when the next World Cup starts.
burnspbesq
@Les Bonnes Femmes:
I can tell you why I’m an Everton fan. I’m a lifelong Mets fan, and Everton:Liverpool::Mets:Evil, Worthless Bronx Scum.
burnspbesq
Benfica, Napoli, Dynamo Kiev, and Besiktas is quite possibly the weakest group in the history of the Champions Leafue.
DLew On Roids
Joel Campbell is probably just as good a striker right now as Lucas Perez, and he’s cheaper. So Arsenal loan out Campbell, get stingy with their attempts to buy a big-name striker, and wind up writing a big check for a guy who they wouldn’t have needed if they’d kept Campbell.
Arsenal Fan TV is going to be a great watch this weekend!
philadelphialawyer
@Temporarily Max McGee (Soon Enough to Be Andy K Again): Which has shit all to do with the current flap…@Amir Khalidolet: First Amendment is not the issue. The issue is management/employer mistreating an employee. A labor law question, to the extent it is legal question at all@burnspbesq: I think she loses her league gig, as well. Moreover, should they really have suspended for YEARS over this?
All in all, folks seem pretty OK with arbitrary punishment meted out based on an off hand comment made in the immediate aftermath of a tough loss. A comment which was not personal, and not bigoted or otherwise outrageous in any way, and was focused on the other team’s game tactics. Bringing up other shit Solo did in the past just shows that the punishment does not fit the crime…well, yeah, DV, drunk driving, and so on are bad things…therefore, it is OK to take her job away because she made a stray comment that doesn’t amount to shit? Um, no, it isn’t. Not fair. And not right. Punish her, in an upfront fashion, for those other things, or not. Don’t use them as a crutch to support punishing her now for basically nothing.
Rommie
@philadelphialawyer: I’m with you on this. It’s transparent punishment for her prior BS, which they couldn’t/wouldn’t do while they needed her for the World Cup and Olympics. It’s far more cowardly than the comment itself, which had plenty of truth (Sweden parked the bus) and is not the first time Team A calls Team B yellow for it. What would normally be lauded as a “heated rivalry” comment was used as the knife in the back by US Soccer.
Les Bonnes Femmes
@Uncle Omar: Brill comment. I always feel the draw is set up for the same four teams in the Semis. This year is the same except for Leicester City. My goodness, they got one of the best draws in CL history.
Les Bonnes Femmes
@burnspbesq: I hear you, Chuck.
Lymie
@philadelphialawyer:
Thank you! Agree completely – a male player would never be suspended for 6 months.
Steeplejack
@philadelphialawyer, @Rommie:
U.S. Soccer explicitly said the suspension was not just for the postgame comments at the Olympics but for the accumulated bullshit before that.
Sunil Gulati, U.S. Soccer president: “Taking into consideration the past incidents involving Hope, as well as the private conversations we’ve had requiring her to conduct herself in a manner befitting a U.S. National Team member, U.S. Soccer determined this is the appropriate disciplinary action.”
Was it an opportunistic moment for the team to sideline her? Of course. The national team’s schedule is very light now, with no major competitions and just a few friendlies ahead. But that could also work to Solo’s advantage as well. She can take the dead time to go low-profile and “work on her issues” or whatever.
There have been multiple comments by analysts and former players, e.g., Julie Foudy, to the effect that Solo has been a troublesome presence on the team for a while, so it comes down to the same calculation as in every other sport: superstar performance vs. superstar soap opera.
lethargytartare
@philadelphialawyer:
it’s a ridiculous suspension, but the criticism of Sweden is equally stupid. Inferior teams playing defensive, counterattacking soccer has been the norm in international soccer forever. It’s easy, as a quality team with a deep player pool (thank you, title 9) to bitch about other teams not playing “right” but this would be akin to asking the US Men to play a 3-4-3 against Germany. Is it really so brave to say, fvck it, have fun and who cares if we lose 7-1? Iceland was just celebrated globally as a wonderful cinderella story for using the exact same tactics in the Euro’s.
Cristiano Ronaldo popped off with comments similar to Hope’s after their match against Iceland. They were both wrong.
So, no, Sweden weren’t cowards. They accurately assessed their quality, made a plan based on that quality, and made it to a final while bypassing supposedly superior competition.
humboldtblue
I’m telling ya, Conte at Chelsea should strike fear into the hearts of fans of any other PL team. They dismantled Burnley today and they did it easily and Eden Hazard has the look of player of the year.