It’s been a while since I’ve posted and I’m sorry for that. I’ve started a new school year and it’s pretty demanding so most nights I’ve been studying with little time to sit down and write up a post. Up next for the Quakes is a home game against Sporting KC. Sporting is on top of the Eastern Conference at this point in the season while the Quakes are still fighting for the 10th and last playoff spot.
While the Quakes are not mathematically out of the playoff race, a loss on Saturday will surely put them mathematically out of the running. A win will keep them alive at the bottom of the hunt but to realistically get into the playoffs the Quakes would have to win out their 4 remaining games and hope for some luck that other teams falter in the final stretch. Here’s the rundown from MLS about what needs to happen for the Quakes to stay in contention this weekend:
San Jose Earthquakes will be eliminated from playoff contention IF:
San Jose tie Kansas City AND:
o Columbus tie or win one game this week AND
o Philadelphia win either game this week AND
o D.C. United win either game this weekSan Jose lose to Kansas City this week AND two of the following occur:
o Philadelphia tie either game this week
o D.C. United win either game this week
o New York defeat Toronto
So a win is a must to realistically remain in the playoff hunt.
There have been several interesting articles on MLSSoccer.com recently. One was about Wondo tying Donovan’s goal total for the Earthquakes Saturday night against Colorado. Wondo had 2 good chances to go ahead of Donovan but was unable to convert a second goal. There was an article about Stephenson playing well up top with Wondo. And earlier today there was an article where Frank Yallop was discussing roster turnover for 2012. He said that there were a couple players who have not been giving their all during training and would be leaving San Jose in the offseason to continue elsewhere. Looking through the stats on the Quakes site I have a couple guesses as to who the two might be. I came up with Tim Ward, Ellis McLoughlin, Anthony Ampaipitakwong and Andrew Weber.
Weber has not made an appearance in MLS all year, and his sub spot was taken over by David Bingham soon after his strong performance against West Brom Albion over the summer. I haven’t seen his name anywhere since June. Tim Ward has 1 appearance this season I think. Like Weber he has seen very little game time this season and I haven’t heard much about him all season long. He is on the older side of his 20s, I think, so he might be better off leaving to go elsewhere.
I was excited to see how Ampai performed this season after the great things Yallop and John Doyle said of him after drafting him. However I don’t think he’s played a minute since late spring, late summer. Granted, right midfield has been a revolving door all season and Ampai had to compete against Joey Gjertsen and then Jacob Peterson, both veterans. So maybe he’s just been used in trainings and practices to push those two this season. McLoughlin hasn’t featured since the first game against Sporting KC in June. In that game McLoughlin came into the game as a sub in the second half and was then subbed out just before the game ended. He seemed a bit confused as to why he was taken out and on camera it looked like he was trying to ask Yallop what happened and why he was taken off, but Yallop ignored him and one of the assistants had to guide him to the bench. Since then he’s been nonexistent on the field. I’ve seen his name on the sub list, but never on the field.
So who might be leaving? I would have to put my money on Tim Ward as a high probability with the others around 50-50. With the Montreal Impact coming into the league, there’s going to be another expansion draft so some of these guys could be picked up by Montreal.
The San Jose Planning Department had a community meeting on Monday night to discuss the new stadium with members of the community. There was a new rendering of the outside of the stadium on display along with an image of what the stadium will look like with the parking lot and nearby streets, an aerial rendering.
I still think the overall design is very bland. Nothing looks new or exciting or innovating. The latest cost figures have been listed as between 50-70 million dollars, and I’m not sure where I heard/read this, but I’ve seen 69 as the official budgetary cost for the stadium. Once of the reasons the stadium is relatively cheap is that there is $0 being supplied by the city or county. In these economic times, it makes sense that government and citizens would be wary about diverting money to a soccer stadium, but the city could have picked up extra revenue by approving in the plans to use the stadium for concerts and other social events. Unfortunately the Front Office nixed those parts of the plans as a concession to the residential communities in the vicinity.
You would think the residents wouldn’t mind a few concerts here and there since they live next to an international airport and CalTrain rail tracks. The organization is missing out on a ton of revenue on this but maybe in the future they can amend the zoning permit to allow concerts and other events. I did some research on other soccer specific stadiums in MLS and the only stadium that cost less than the Quakes stadium, adjusted for inflation, is Columbus Crew Stadium, which opened in 1999 and cost 39 million dollars in 2011 dollars. JELD-Wen field’s renovation was 39 million dollars. Every other stadium cost more than 100 million to build, with the exception of BMO Field and Pizza Hut Park. I think the team is missing out on a great way to generate new interest in the team both locally and nationally. The designs need to improve so the stadium doesn’t look like something that’s coming out of the 1950s. The horseshoe design still annoys me but since it’s this late in the planning process I doubt the stadium is going to change drastically. At least we’ll have a permanent home.
All images courtesy of www.centerlinesoccer.com
Fifa 12 came out Tuesday. Last year I wrote about the team in the game and looked at player rankings and actual players on the team. This year EA threw MLS a bone and made every team at least a 3 star team with at least 2 players ranked in the 70s in stats. Last year the game was criticized for seemly making MLS unnecessarily weak so this year MLS got a bump in stats. I won’t be getting the game anytime soon so I can’t do a post about our players’ rankings yet. Hopefully I can pick it up soon when I have more time to play.
GO QUAKES!
