Arena The Clint Dempsey, Tim Howard, and Landon Donovan Mancrush Thread: The Arena's American Soccer Hub

Would anyone be up for MLS fantasy? It's done salary cap style ...

How much work does it entail? Not sure I know the players on other teams well enough...

Jermaine Jones had a nice goal for Schalke today.

The only difference I've seen is no more mandatory Facebook integration.

Timo ... Time commitment isn't bad. Just watching for injuries and bye-weeks. Salary Cap store means no worries about trades or anything.

I might be down for that. I would help me learn more about players on the different teams.

I don't think I know enough.

Well, it looks like Inty's ability to set up MLS Fantasy Leagues is going on the Monday Meh List.

But, hey, today is First Kick! And it's about time, too.

Crew play at Chivas tonight. Love starting the season with a very winnable road game. Three points are never a given - especially on the road - but on paper, Chivas is the worst team in the league.

Sebastion LeToux got the first goal of MLS 2013, as Philadelphia dominated the Sporks for most of the first half. However, burgeoning Inty Man Crush Graham Zusi scored an equalizer just before the break. It was a pretty easy shot from a rebound, but it was a nice finish from Zusi anyways. Need to see that guy in form as we approach the CRC and MEX matches without Donovan.

First Timbers match of the season today!!! I am stoked!

I got my ticket. Go Timbers!

Nice, nice, nice win for the Crew last night. Three points on the road? Very nice. Looking like you actually know how to play as a team and have the ability to generate offense? Even better. Higuain was his normal magical self, scoring a firecracker of a goal. The team looked potent on set pieces all night, and good deliver from Eddie Gaven got the second goal on a sweet finish from Williams. Then, with time almost gone, the new guy - Oduro - showed his wheels (which you better have when you twitter handle is Freakyfast8) and got the third on a breakaway. Overall, some sloppiness with some poor giveaways, but nice to see them punish and dominate a lesser team. If the Crew is able to gel, they just might make my Twitter bravado come true, and make their one game on ESPN - the MLS Cup Final.

Fantastic, highly entertaining game from Portland. Fun to watch.

At the same time, gritty, disappointing, but ultimately encouraging 3-1 loss by the US U-20's in the CONCACAF U-20 Final. Mexico takes the win, but the US U-20's took them to ET on Mexican Soil. It took a beauty of a bicycle kick to put them ahead in ET1, and then a PK/Red Card to give the final, deflating blow.

Still, encouraging to the see the U-20's play so well, and to qualify for the World Cup. Especially in light of the failure to qualify for both the Olympics and the last U-20 World Cup.

Okay wait, that good of a match was played by Portland and it gets two small sentences from you? But then two paragraphs about some U-20s team? Harsh. Admittedly I might not be completely myself at this point in the evening...

Fine.

Nagbe is something else. Boy, do I love watching him play. He has the skill to either lead Portland to a Cup, or get a hefty transfer fee it if Europe ... Possibly both. RBNY looked confused defensively ... If not for a few gaffes turned into gifts from the Timbers, that could have been a 4-1 scoreline. Not sure if the rumor that Henry and Cahill played last night are true.

Houston Dynamo picked up a 1-0 home win over Santos Laguna tonight in CCL play. It's the proverbial "hold serve" win. They have a slight advantage going into the second leg, but not enough to make me think Santos won't advance. The only advantage they have is that Houston will advance with a draw or a one-goal loss by any scoreline other than 1-0. I'd expect Santos to win, at home, by 2-3.

That's better! We do love us some Nagbe!

So, as it turns out that "knock" Timmy Howard picked up was actually ... a broken back.


****

So, that means 2/3rds of the listed "man crush" in the thread title will not be playing in Denver or Mexico. That kind of sucks.

Luckily, Guzan has looked good for Aston Villa this year - not a HUGE drop-off from Timmy. Still, with the problems with mis-communication in the last game, adding another new face back there is not ideal.

Rough time to be a US 'keeper ... Solo injured and out 3-4 months ...

Brad Guzan, please stay fit!

Friedel tweeted today that if Guzan was injured he'd come back and suit up for the nats. I think it'd be epic to see old man Friedel go down and shut out Mexico in Azteca.

Guzan, Rimando, and either Hamid or Johnson isn't a bad place to be. It's not the overstated depth that some USMNT fans think we have (we're not the GK depth of Spain or Brazil or Germany), but it's not a bad depth chart.