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Americans Abroad: Weekend Rewind

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Fulham is out of the bottom three.

Yes, you read that last sentence correctly. Thanks to a Brian McBride header and Fulham’s 2-0 win against Birmingham, the Cottagers now have their relegation fate in their own hands heading into the final weekend of the EPL season. A Fulham win against Portsmouth on Sunday and McBride and his fellow Americans will be back in the English Premier League for one more season.

Fulham’s resurgence is one of the few bright spots for Americans Abroad this weekend. The Did Not Dress club was full this week, with everyone from Freddy Adu to Jonathan Spector failing to make it into uniform this weekend. Given the amount of time so many key Americans have spent in Europe this season I can’t help but think that we will see as many as a dozen or more Americans making transfer moves this summer.

Here is how the Americans Abroad did this weekend:

This week’s edition of American’s Abroad: Weekend Rewind is brought to you by ASA: FC Barcelona, the summer residency program that allows teenage soccer players to be Americans Abroad, training at fabled FC Barcelona this summer. If you want to experience the dream of playing and training at FC Barcelona, then contact ASA: FC Barcelona for information on the July camp.

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Now, here is how the rest of the Americans Abroad did this weekend in Europe and Mexico:

ENGLAND

  • Brian McBride started, played 90 minutes and scored the game-winning goal in Fulham’s 2-0 win against Birmingham on Saturday.
  • Kasey Keller started, played 90 minutes and made one save for Fulham.
  • Clint Dempsey started and played 90 minutes for Fulham.
  • Carlos Bocanegra dressed but did not start for Fulham.
  • Eddie Johnson did not dress for Fulham.
  • Marcus Hahnemann started, played 90 minutes and made four saves in Reading’s 1-0 loss to Tottenham on Saturday.
  • Bobby Convey did not dress for Reading.
  • Tim Howard started, played 90 minutes and made two saves in Everton’s 1-0 loss to Arsenal on Sunday.
  • Brad Friedel started, played 90 minutes and made two saves in Blackburn’s 3-1 win vs. Derby County on Saturday.
  • Eddie Lewis started and played 72 minutes for Derby County.
  • Benny Feilhaber dressed but did not play for Derby County.
  • Jonathan Spector did not dress for West Ham United’s 4-2 loss vs. Manchester Unjited on Saturday.
  • Jay DeMerit did not dress in Watford’s 1-1 tie vs. Blackpool on Sunday.
  • Matt Pickens did not dress in Queens Park Rangers’ 5-0 win vs. Burnley on Sunday. He is out with a seperated shoulder.

GERMANY

  • Steve Cherundolo started, played 90 minutes and drew a yellow card in Hannover 96’s 1-1 tie vs. Schalke 04 on Saturday.
  • Sal Zizzo did not dress for Hannover 96.
  • Bryan Arguez did not dress in Hertha Berlin’s 3-1 win vs. Karlsruhe on Saturday.
  • Heath Pearce did not dress in Hansa Rostock’s 3-1 loss to Hamburg on Saturday.
  • Neven Subotic started and played 90 minutes in Mainz 05’s 2-1 win vs. Kaiserslautern on Friday.
  • Luis Robles dressed but did not play for Kaiserslautern
  • Josh Wolff dressed but did not play in 1860 Munich’s 3-0 loss to Freiburg on Friday.
  • Gregg Berhalter did not dress for 1860 Munich.
  • Josh Grenier did not dress in TUS Koblenz’s 2-0 win vs. Wehen on Sunday.
  • Joe Enochs dressed but did not play in Osnabruck’s 1-1 tie vs. Carl Zeiss Jena on Friday.

HOLLAND

  • Michael Bradley started and played 90 minutes in Heerenveen’s 2-1 loss to Ajax Amsterdam in the Dutch Eredivisie Champions League semifinal first-leg. The second leg will be played today.

ITALY

  • Gabriel Ferrari did not dress in Sampdoria’s 3-0 loss to Roma on Sunday.
  • Danny Szetela did not play in Brescia’s 3-0 win against Modena on Saturday.

SPAIN

  • Giuseppe Rossi started and played 90 minutes in Villarreal’s 2-0 victory against Getafe on Sunday.

FRANCE

  • Quentin Westberg dressed but did not play in FC Troyes 1-0 loss to AC Ajaccio on Friday.

PORTUGAL

  • Freddy Adu did not dress in Benfica’s 0-0 tie vs. Estrela Amadora on Sunday.

BELGIUM

  • Oguchi Onyewu started and played 90 minutes in Standard Liege’s 3-0 win vs. Dender on Saturday.

DENMARK

  • Danny Califf started and played 90 minutes in AaB’s 1-0 win vs. Viborg FF on Sunday.
  • Lee Nguyen started and played 90 minutes in Randers FC’s 3-2 loss to Esjberg on Sunday.
  • Jeremiah White did not play for AGF Aarhus’s 2-0 loss to Odense on Saturday.

MEXICO

  • Edgar Castillo started and played 90 minutes in Santos’ 4-1 win vs. San Luis on Sunday.
  • Michael Orozco did not dress for San Luis.
  • Jose Francisco Torres came off the bench and played 33 minutes in Pachuca’s 0-0 tie vs. UNAM Pumas on Sunday.
  • Daniel Hernandez started and played 90 minutes in Chiapas’ 2-2 vs. Chivas de Guadalajara.

NORWAY

  • Troy Perkins started and played 90 minutes in Valarenga’s 2-1 loss to Molde on Sunday.
  • Adin Brown started and played 90 minutes in Aalesunds FK’s 4-0 loss to Lyn on Sunday.
  • Pat Noonan came off the bench and played 31 minutes for Aalesunds FK.
  • Willis Forko started, played 90 minutes and drew a yellow card in Bodo Glimt’s 2-1 win vs. Stromsgodset on Sunday.

What do you think of how the Americans Abroad did this weekend? Share your thoughts below.

Comments

  1. Ives, I dont think you have anything against Fulham – I did not intend to imply that in my post. I was just teasing you, because everyone, including me at one point, had them being relegated.

    As I said, I hope they can stay up with a win at Portsmouth. All the best.

    -Neal

    Reply
  2. Yeah, so in what could possibly be Bradley’s performance for Heerenveen, he gets two red cards in the first half, and they never really had a chance after that.

    Reply
  3. ConMan,

    Convey looks like he has fallen out of favor at reading. He’s been back from injury for like 3 weeks now, but he didn’t make the bench last week and he let the press know how he felt about it a day later, ripping steve coppell in the process. So I think its probable that he might be making a move this summer.

    And idk about DeMerit…

    Reply
  4. Ives:

    Are you sure you’re not mistaken about Willis Forko’s team?

    I’m pretty sure that Bodo Glimt was one of the dwarves in Lord of the Rings! 🙂

    Reply
  5. Ives,

    Any word on Conveys and DeMerits situations?

    Also, about the relegation situation, Reading stands a hell of a lot better chance than do Fulham, because, well Reading is only playing the worst team in the history of the EPL, however, lets hope that Pompey is gonna concentrate on the FA Cup.

    Besides, a year in CCC cant exactly hurt Dempsey, he simply becomes even more comfortable, and a year in the CCC is exactly what Johnson needs, the guy has fallen off the face of the planet is seems, is he even getting reserve time?!

    Reply
  6. I think Spector is injured that’s why he didn’t dress. They mentioned he was on the long injury list for West ham during the match.

    Reply
  7. Come on Neal, I wrote that because I thought they had been eliminated. Clearly I was wrong, but don’t make me out to be a Fulham basher. I wouldn’t write nearly as much about them as I do if I had something against them.

    Reply
  8. Fulham’s hope is that Pompey has been been seriously out of form lately. Seems they have one eye on the FA Cup final.

    Reading is playing Derby and let’s be honest…Derby is…not good.

    Reply
  9. Not to pick on you Ives, but I had to pull up one of your quotes from many moons ago:

    “Fulham are toast.”

    -Ives Galarcep

    Do you still feel this way now? To be fair, I think we all had them down, and they still could be relegated. But lets hope for the best at Pompey. COYW’s

    Reply
  10. Don’t know where else to put this, but Heerenveen is taking on Ajax in Amsterdam in the semifinals for he Champions League qualification. Bradley and his team need to overturn a disappointing 2-1 loss at home in the first leg. So they will need at least two goals (since one would mean 2-2, but Ajax through on away goals)

    Reply
  11. He’ll probably fall into the did not dress category as well for now, but what about adding Alfredo Morales, Arguez’s recently discovered teammate at Hertha Berlin?

    Reply
  12. The only way both Reading and Fulham can stay up is if they both win along with Bolton losing to Chelsea. In addition their wins and Bolton’s loss must combine to reverse their goal differential deficit of 11 and 5 goals respectively. So at least one of Reading and Fulham are going down. Also if they both get less than a win and Birmingham beats Blackburn then they both go down.

    Reply
  13. Matt…it’s called loyalty. This is the club that brought him to England and the club that gave him his shot after a rough first season. We’ve seen things like this before, look at the team Juventus had in Serie B recently.

    MiamiAl, have patience. Why does everyone forget how long it took some players–Dempsey is the perfect example–to get minutes? Everyone was calling him a failure when he first started playing a few minutes here and there. It amazes me how hypocritical we all can be, as American fans.

    Not only that, it’s also hilarious that we all assume we know what’s best for certain guys. Dempsey is a big boy…I think he knows what’s best for himself. The same way that Eddie Money does. Unlike some of their fans they realize that you can’t just go to a new team in a new (far better) league and immediately be a superstar. Why so many of us Americans expect that from them I will never understand.

    Reply
  14. I thought the Dempsey move was strange too. But maybe Deuce feels that Coca Cola would be a better option than coming back to MLS. I think maybe he left MLS with bitter feelings.

    I think these guys that are not even dressing, and sitting in street clothes watching their bottom feeding teams have demonstrated that some of these players have made bad career choices. They have hurt their chances to get involved in helping our team in South Africa.

    Reply
  15. I’m not Ives, but…

    To stay up, Reading has to win against Derby and Fulham has to either lose or tie at Portsmouth.

    Reply
  16. plenty of teams in the EPL would pony up some dough for Dempsey. He has shown that he has the strength to make it there and also some uncommon skill. If a guy can score that many goals for a crappy team with no midfield, they know he can contribute elsewhere too.

    This extension means Fulham will make some money off him if they go down.

    And if they stay up, they have just tied up a valuable player.

    Reply
  17. Matt-

    Although I think that Clint is going to stay at Fulham regardless of what happens, him signing a contract means that Fulham could get much more value If another team wants to buy him. Think about Boruc at Celtic… most people don’t think he’ll be there after this summer, but the club signed him to an extension to increase there return.

    I say best case scenario is they stay up! If not, let’s hope they can atleast put him on loan to somewhere else in a top flight.

    Reply
  18. Matt … dont get me wrong I think dempsey has been a quality player but the reality is there are not to many EPL teams that would be immediately interested in him. It would be a big risk to hold out.. why not go for the sure thing?

    Ives,

    What are the statistical scenario’s of what could happen next weekend and who will get relegated? More specifically, What needs to happen for Reading to stay in the EPL? Fulham?

    Reply
  19. I’m waiting for the inevitable overreaction regarding Adu’s playing time.

    Benfica is one point back of a Champions League spot with one game to play, and are on their third coach.

    Common sense dictates with the high expectations placed on the Benfica coaches, that when they’re coming in they’re relying on veteran players in order to qualify for the Champions League and save their own jobs.

    I have no doubt with the production he’s shown so far, and Rui Costa’s impending retirement, that Adu will be looked at as the front-runner to take over next season.

    Reply
  20. Ives,

    Did you see that Dempsey signed a contract extension keeping him at Fulham through 2010? I am a little surprised he didn’t wait until after next week’s game to see whether they will be relegated or not. I would imagine that if Fulham drops to the Championship then Dempsey would want to play at another Premier League team instead of staying at Fulham. Any thoughts?

    Reply

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