Mr. Dempsey has had his work permit approved according to his family. Please read our exclusive chat with the latest American abroad....

An interview I did for EPL Talk has been uploaded, you can also subscribe to Chris' podcasts via iTunes, which yours truly does. Or doth.

Manchester City is the team of the day, as their 1-0 win, coming on Joey Barton's pk, snapped a 19-game spell of futility against the Londoners.

The result, arguably against the run of play, consigned the Gunners to their worst start in 14 years: Arsenal have but  a single point to their name. Tomas Rosicky made his debut for the Gunners and intermittently looked capable, but the real problems for Arsenal seem to be an unwillingness to shoot combined with the continuing lack of a striking partner for Thierry Henry. Henry didn't seem himself today, either, muffing a number of chances. Credit fine defense and game-saving play from City keeper Nicky Weaver.

Arsenal weren't the only contenders to take a tumble today: Tottenham was humiliated today by a ten-man Everton side, 2-0 at home. The Merseysiders seems to be down and out when Kevin Kilbane was sent off with an hour to go, but it was the White Hart Lane crowd who left crestfallen as they suffered through a gutsy, dominating performance by the Toffees that surely will raise more questions about the direction of Spurs.

Elsewhere today, Liverpool rallied to get a vital win at West Ham behind Peter Crouch''s strike and Manchester United offed Watford to go top of the table with three wins in three games. Fulham fans will be cheered with their side's first win and Charlton also got on the board with a 2-0 victory over a sluggish Bolton.

Nearer and dearer to our hearts, Dundee United got a win (yes, a win!) with a 3-1 performance at St. Mirren. Across the street, Dundee lost 1-0 to Livingston at Dens.

Letterhack Christopher Wade sez it all:

"I thought you would find this article [in the Boston Globe, registration req. but free] interesting: I love how Dell'Apa points out that the Revolution and Dempsey have no control over the transfer negotiations and it all comes from MLS HQ. This stubbornness by MLS will just cause bitterness and they will end up getting nothing for Dempsey because his play will suffer because he does not care (thus lowering his value) or he will just wait out his contract.
 
"If MLS were a true business they would sell their talent when it peaks and use the proceeds to reinvest in their “product”, thus creating a wider pool of quality players. This wider pool of quality players would improve play and make it easier to sell their good players."

We agree, Christopher. One note: Dell'Apa insinuates that MLS received an offer of "$2m" for Dempsey — the offer was actually a bit higher than that, In other news, Demspey remains in the market, but a move is unlikely until January.


 

Give it up for little Accrington, which today won its first ever league cup game, and knocked off a two-time European champion in the process. OK, they beat Forest, but still.

After watching today's appallingly bad New England-Chicago game, this article in the California-based Daily Breeze seemed particularly relevant. I'll write more on this as part of the promised series on MLS, but some of this stuff — especially Alexi Lalas' insouciance towards his fellow players — is hard to ####.

England, of course, opened with a #### this weekend — Manchester United looks very good while L'Arsenal struggled against l'anti-jouers pour Aston Villa. Best performance outside of the Red Devils' demolition of sad Fulham? Perhaps Bolton, which looked very solid against a wasteful Tottenham.

...dropping points to weaker teams in their EPL debut. Seems Rafa's boys are right on course.

Now that this World Cup business is safely behind us we can again turn our attention to the real championships in football.

No disrespect, folks, but last we looked there were only about six high-quality teams in Germany 2006 while the rest were flailing away trying hard not to lose. The best football is club football these days. That’s been the case since the creation of the “super leagues,” and the EPL is very much in the vanguard of this new wave.

Thanks to the fact that nobody quite seems to know in Italy which players will actually show up for the big clubs on opening day (to say nothing of which division they’ll be playing in) Europe right now has just two truly world-class leagues getting underway. They are England’s Premiership and Spain’s “Primera” — Germany still trails by a slender, but noticeable margin.

We feel it is safe to say that these two countries will dominate the European Cup season: At least three EPL clubs and three Spanish clubs will reach the last eight of UEFA Champions League before we even know the draw for the group stages. A German side, perhaps a Dutch or Portuguese entry, or even an Italian side — if they are actually playing instead of simply arranging results to save on the travel costs — should complete the quarterfinals.

We are mindful that detractors of English football (and boosters of other leagues) will point out that there are really just a small handful of clubs competing for the title this season. Yet how many teams can truly compete in Spain, or in our own NFL, NBA or baseball? The fact is, England may have only a handful of teams that can seize the title, but well over half of this league is stocked with quality — a good dozen of these teams could hold their own in any league around the planet.

Yes, we’re also aware that the new season is opening on a sour note as English fans are voting with their feet. Viewers will see some empty seats in the Premiership this weekend on their TVs as there are a number of games that have yet to sell out. Part of this is due to the increased number of games available on TV, for starters, but we admit that part of this is due to the prevailing wisdom that Chelsea has the league locked up.

But, as we’re rarely ones to go along with convention, we’re begging to differ.

The fact is that while a year ago we could confidently give the Londoners the title before the first ball was kicked, this new season is not quite so predictable. Don’t start thinking that Reading is about to challenge for the title. But we do believe there are four teams who could win the EPL this season: Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool or Manchester United.

The history of the Premiership also suggests that at least one team will be the surprise of the season. It was Everton a couple of years ago, and Tottenham last year, and it is sure to be someone else this season as, sorry to say for Spurs fans, history also suggests that it is far, far harder to repeat an unexpectedly good season. While the White Hart Lane loyalists are no doubt dreaming of a top-4 EPL finish this time after coming so close they may well discover that the weight of expectations will drag them back into the middle of the table.

We also can confidently predict that Reading, Sheffield United and Watford will be lucky to escape relegation. It doesn’t take much o####rasp of the modern football world to note that gaining promotion is a poisoned pawn for teams which suddenly must spend with the big boys — but often have little chance to even consolidate in their season among the elite. And were we a Manchester City supporter we think we’d be looking at finishing at least one place above the three newcomers while hoping for the best.

The rest of the field is largely a collection of teams that can win on the day, but not often enough., Bolton, Blackburn, Newcastle and Everton can make runs. We’d like to think that newly purchased Aston Villa can make a return to past form.. But for Fulham, Charlton, West Ham United, and others of that ilk, fans will see teams that compete hard every day but lack the depth of quality talent to do more than be spoilers as far as the league race is concerned.

Which brings us back to the four contenders:

1) Chelsea has so much talent that it may seem ridiculous to have doubts about the prospects at Stamford Bridge. However, even very good teams with very good management (Chelsea has both) invariably reach a point where there are too many horses and not enough drivers. Last season it appeared that the Chelsea mystique was waning. In Germany, the efforts of the two-year slog through every competition seemed to have taken its toll on Frank Lampard, (John Terry apparently does not know what being tired is all about.) Jose Mourinho’s team is the favorite to make it a championship treble — but we don’t think they’ll run away with it.

2) Our pick to push the Blues is Liverpool. This is clearly a confident bunch with the talent and spirit to win its first EPL title. (Yes, that’s right: the Reds have not won a league title since 1989-90, before the EPL came into existence.) Manager Rafa Benitez has been saying all the right things, and the additions of Jermaine Pennant Craig Bellmay will help. Liverpool has to overcome its nasty habit of dropping points against weaker teams, and do a better job of recovering at home after playing well in Europe or against a major rival, to be sure. But this is a squad to watch.

3) Manchester United is always in the picture. If Wayne Rooney is truly back to full fitness even the loss of Ruud van Nistelrooy can be overcome, but we still have questions about the Red Devils’ defense and cannot help wondering at what point Edwin van de Sar will simply get old. The return of Paul Scholes must help, and there is optimism about the addition of Michael Carrick from Tottenham. Yet Sir Alex Ferguson is in the hot seat for the first time in a while: We have grave doubts as to whether or not the Glazers will accept another “losing” season. What United need is a fast start that would enable them to regain a swagger that seems to have disappeared. While common sense argues that the team isn’t good enough to win it, there is every reason to think that if anyone can unseat Chelsea it is a hungry, angry and under-pressure Ferguson.

4) Arsenal has a bright new home and new Czech midfielder Tomas Rosicky but have the same set of questions that dogged the Gunners last year. Unsettled Ashley Cole and Jose Antonio Reyes still must be dealt with and there is not much depth in the back. The team also lost some big bodies and there are legitimate questions whether the Gunners can prosper in overtly physical contests. But the Gunners have a bevy of attacking talent and the will to play an open, finesse style. Whether they can concentrate on the EPL and Europe simultaneously remains to be seen; that’s something Arsene Wenger has yet to prove his side can do. Of the four, Arsenal has the worst chance of finishing atop the table.

Our picks to round out the top ten:

5) Tottenham. Swelled by Didier Zokora and Dimitar Berbarov, Spurs look like up-and-comers. The question, of course, is if they are overachievers. Jermain DeFoe must have a breakout season.

6) Bolton. Allardyce’s boys are unfashionable, but this a team that is truly a pain in the butt to play against. They lack a breakout forward, but have a solid middle with Kevin Nolan and Gary Speed and grind out a lot of games.

7) Newcastle. Losing Michael Owen is a big blow, but Damien Duff was a solid pickup. Not titleists, but a good mid-table side.

8) Blackburn. Is the loss of Craig Bellamy addition by subtraction? Time will tell. This is a solid side, and if Jason Roberts can deliver, Rovers could cruise.

9) Everton. A make or break season with a big gamble on Manchester United’s Tim Howard joining them in the nets. The Yank has proven he can play — but has his confidence returned? Andy Johnson should help, and getting rid of Duncan Ferguson is a blessing in disguise.

10) West Ham United. Dean Ashton’s injury has already cast a pall over Alan Pardew’s men, but some good off-season pickups in Lee Bowyer, Johnathan Spector and Carlton Cole should strengthen what was a good squad to begin with.

Reliable sources told me this morning that MLS has turned down a "multi-million" dollar offer from English Premier League club Charlton Athletic for the New England Revolution midfielder. Dempsey, who has made no secret of his desire to leave MLS, will be out of contract with the league in 2007.

Published reports in England and the USA that West Ham United had approached the player's representatives or the league are incorrect. At least one other team has expressed interest in the player: Turkey's Fenerbahce has spoken to team personnel with the New England Revolution.

DeRosario scores a fine strike at distance after receieving the ball from O'Brien. DeRosario actually shrugged off Mikel to give himself a little room on the shot, but the placement gave Hilario no chance.

I wonder if Shaun-Wright Phillps wishes he could play aginst Josh Gros every day? Who would have thought a young man from our capital would make SWP look so good?

Conrad had a nice blooper into Ching that Cudicini ably snuffed away.

Little on-field excitement at present. Chellseas has been gracious enough to allow the MLS guys time and space to actually string together some passes — canny watcher swill have noticed that four defenders were kind enough to allow Albright to get control of a pass in the box before relieving him of it.

Jimmy Conrad's ill-considered tackle on Didier Drogba gave Frank Lampard a nice free kick attempt, and Troy Perkins did well to save it to his left. Still, it's a stroll in thje park so far. Perhaps they should all be wearing white sweaters and eating cucumber sandwiches?

A full house here today at the All-Star Game, though the crowd seems to be pretty heavily pro-Chelsea, as one would expect. It’s a pretty steamy day in suburban Chicago as well; a lot of folks are cooling off on the patios.

Weird trivia: No guys jumping out of planes onto the field or having a fly-over today here, however — the Firehouse is in Midway airport’s flight path zone and the FAA wouldn’t grant clearance. However, Southwest jets fly over about every five minutes, anyway.

Josh Gros missed a chance to finish a nice play on a cross from Albright in the 7th minute — linesman Nate Clement ruled the ball had gone out of bounds, however.

So far a pretty easy game – no real tackles and Chelsea is coasting at about ½ speed.

Howdy, folks. We're here in Bridgeview, getting ready for the kickoff. The preview is up at here, the guys are on the field, and we'll be back in ten with some pre-game notes.

CHICAGO (August 3) – This week at the Fire’s new Bridgeview stadium complex, the 11th MLS All-Star game will pit an MLS select side against a pre-season Chelsea team gearing up to defend its second-straight English Premiership title.

Chelsea is an interesting choice of opponent for MLS. Arguably, this team is what MLS, as a league, aspires to be in the future. It’s also worth noting that both organizations have taken diametrically opposite paths to get where they are today.

The one thing the two outfits have in common, of course, are deep-pocketed investors with deliberately obscured, murky backgrounds and a propensity for losing money. Chelsea announced a loss of $252 million — the largest ever in soccer history — back in January. Owner Roman Abramovich has spent some $600 million in transfers since 2003 (accounting for 40% of all transfer monies spent in the Premiership in 2005, according to auditors Deloitte).

Coincidentally, $600m is about what MLS has lost in eleven seasons of play, with only two clubs, Los Angeles’s Galaxy and New England, coming close in that time to profitability. (New England’s profitability is now questionable considering the dramatic fall-off in attendance the club has experienced.)

That’s where the similarities end: Where Abramovich introduced a new paradigm into European football with his New York Yankee’s style of management, MLS’ attempt to change the rules with single-entity ownership remains a work in progress. MLS is light years behind the Big Five (MLB, NBA, NFL, NHL and Nascar) in both quality of play and interest; indeed, MLS has still to justify the “major” in its sobriquet at about every level, term becoming both a blessing and a curse.

Where Abramovich has been profligate, MLS has been parsimonious. And while Abramovich benefited from a slow-moving cadre of competitors, MLS has had to face off against well-financed, knowledgeable opponents across the American sports spectrum.

But while Abramovich has been blamed (by some) for “ruining” the English game, there’s no question that he has, in three years, demonstrated what the American “big-league” sports mentality can do to the European game. Some will sniff at that notion, claiming that Abramovich can buy any player he wants, which is the same argument used against the New York Yankees. The truth, however, is that success comes from blending complementary talents. There’s a lot to be said for knowing which players to buy and who can most effectively manage your assets — give Abramovich credit for hiring two experienced pros in Peter Kenyon and Jose Mourinho to do just that.

MLS, apparently, doesn’t have an open wallet. That’s why its odd that that the league has not leveraged all its assets by any stretch. In fact, eleven years in, it’s worth noting that MLS turned its back on one of the biggest resources available to it and is paying a hefty price for it.

When MLS kicked off, it marketed itself as the “anti-NASL.” Where the NASL recklessly over-expanded, MLS was going to take it slow. Where the NASL loaded up on over the hill players, MLS was going to instead be “an American league to develop American players.” MLS had a business plan that was going to rope in the huge number of rec players, contain costs, and make everyone a tidy profit. One day, MLS execs said, America will be home to the best league in the world.

As we know today, this was pure hubris.

One of the biggest reasons for this is simply the lack of experienced, knowledgeable soccer people in the league. There are a number of folks out there who know something about the game and are eager to help out. Yet because of MLS’ encoded animosity toward the NASL — encapsulated in commissioner Don Garber’s historically questionable assertion (to us in fact, here) that the NASL “didn't provide long-term benefits to the sport” — MLS has never reached out to the folks who were there first.

This is a rotten waste of capital. Just off the top of our heads, guys like Jay Emmett, Clive Toye, Noel Lemmon, Dave Socha (a World Cup ref 24 years ago) and Gordon Bradley, are experienced administrators who at the very least could be tapped to help reform what is a badly damaged development track and probably could help advise a new generation of scouts. Some other former NASL’ers also have something increasingly common among older Americans — money. Why aren’t these folks, who had some success in the 1970s, being tapped today to help fund some of the projects soccer needs to succeed in the USA?

We suspect a reason MLS doesn’t reach out is that many of the former NASL’ers would have a disturbing tendency to actually put the game first, and the marketing second. Say what you want about the NASL, but they did put a good product on the field. They may or may not have been the over-the-hill gang, but the NASL did have a bunch of guys who actually knew how to play the game. Take a look back at the rosters from the 1974 World Cup. A fair number of those guys went on to play in the NASL before too long. Now take a look at the 2006 World Cup roster. How many of them will ever kick a ball in MLS?

Moreover, they cared about it, deeply. And while we hate to agree with Giorgio Chignalia, he had a valid point when he noted last month that Americans like stars. Would spending a few million more a team on players — and a few million less bringing teams over for exhibition matches — really be such a bad idea?

Has MLS made strides? Yes — it has managed to get a handful of arenas built for its teams, has survived expansion, contraction and now looks set to expand again. Monday, Fox announced a deal to pay the league rights fees for some telecasts, and Univision looks set to follow suit. These are steps in the right direction for a business, to be sure.

But the business at its center remains hollow. MLS still doesn’t have a good enough product on the field to tear people away from competing entertainment.

We don’t like it, but the truth is that MLS has no true stars, little respect outside the country and a fan base that has remained dismayingly static. As a result, MLS has failed to rope in the large number of folks who enjoy the game or just plain like sports. The 2006 World Cup defied expectations in the USA by showing that Americans will watch soccer even if Team USA isn’t playing. What these fans do demand, however, is top quality, and MLS can’t yet consistently deliver that. Every other pro league in America has the world’s best players. MLS has none of them.

We know the guys try like hell every game, but the fact that so many players in the league can’t trap a ball exquisitely, can’t keep the ball in between the touchlines for extravagantly developed plays, can’t see the entire field or anticipate the next pass, and can’t shoot on net is glaringly obvious to a novice. And truthfully, those of us who have pleaded for patience over the years are at the end of our tethers — eleven years should be long enough for even the most slavish fan to realize that the league is failing at its core mission, which must be, as we have been told, to develop quality American soccer players, coaches and refs.

And this brings us to where we came in. MLS wants to use Saturday’s All-Star game as a measuring stick. The league clearly feels that if its “boys” can hang against Chelsea, well, then they’re not doing too badly. The problem is, the whole equation is false. How does putting the best players of a mediocre league against a top team in pre-season training, in a meaningless friendly, reveal anything about where the league truly is?

We think, truthfully, that the game, without even having kicked off, has already shown how far MLS has yet to come. We also think MLS should pay more attention to the lessons Chelsea and the NASL offer — or better yet, start making use of the resources.

And by the way, even if you disagree with our take on the league and the value of the NASL, one fact is really tough to argue away: The fans aren’t coming on Saturday to see MLS’ “Best XI.” They’re coming to see the stars.

That says about all you need to know about MLS right now, and it’s a shame, because it doesn’t have to be this way.