Barcelona is advancing!!!

I can't believe it. They were down 1-0 to Chelsea since the 8th minute of the game. They were down a man due to a red card. Then suddenly they go and score in the third minute of stoppage time. Final score 1-1 and Barcelona advances due to the visitor's advantage. (Chelsea was at home)

Barcelona fans must be delirious right now and Chelsea supporters are crushed.

Major League Soccer, Season Begins!

The Major League Soccer games have started again!!! There's a new team this year, The Seattle Sounders. We're watching them right now as they play the New York RedBulls. The Sounders are winning 3-0. It's exciting that a new team is doing so well. They have one really good player, Montero, from Columbia who is very good. He has two goals already and several very dangerous plays. On his second goal he stole the ball from a defender then beat the goalie one on one to score.

Arg, can't write more, going to watch the game.

Go Fire!

The Chicago Fire are beating the New York Red Bulls 4-1! (soccer) The Fire are already guaranteed a spot in the play offs. New York is in the hunt for one of two wild card spots. They still have some hope if they lose tonight (which they look like they'll do) but they'll have to rely on D.C. United either loosing or tying. Chris Rolfe of Chicago got a hat trick in the first half alone. His second goal was really, really pretty. He received a cross from another player, bounced it off his chest, then volleyed it straight into the goal without the ball touching the ground.

Oo. New York just had a really good scoring chance but the Fire goalie just had a big save.

I'm sort of rooting for the Fire. If New York looses then D.C. United has a better chance of getting in. I'm not sure why I like D.C. but I do for some reason. They had a really good season last year but this year they've had a lot of injuries to all their good players and they didn't play well either. It's rather doubtful that they'll get in though. Oh well.

Chicago just scored again! It was a first career goal for one of their players. Good for him. Now the score is 5-1. And they just almost scored again. Wow. Now it's a corner kick . . . that didn't end up being very dangerous. I'm pretty sure Chicago will win though. :)

Arg. A N.Y. player just ran through the defense, got past the goalie, and passed to another guy who got his shot blocked. Yikes, a close one. That was some bad defending.

There are only 10 minutes left now. A win for Chicago.

3rd Presidential Debate, and World Cup Qualifying

The third and last presidential debate is going on right now. By now, I've heard everything that the candidates are saying. They have set messages that they have to deliver and they keep repeating them. Say McCain attacks Obama. Then Obama goes into his planned 'absolutely not true' response and throws in a couple attacks on McCain along the way. Same goes when Obama attacks McCain. It's getting sort of old . . .
However, Obama just had a nice speech on education which I really agreed with. Get more parents involved, give credit for community service, lower costs of college. :)

In general these days though I'm rather tired of all the mud throwing and politics. There was a strip in the comics today where one of the characters put in an absentee ballot just so he could get his vote over with.

Oh, but the moderator (Bob Schieffer [not sure on the spelling of his last name]) is doing a much better job then his predecessors. He is actually interrupting the candidates and chiding them when they don't answer the questions. He also asked some very good questions and follow up questions.

The U.S. soccer team just lost to Trinidad and Tobago in a world cup qualifying match. The game was in Trinidad and Tobago, and it was airing during the debate. I actually watched more of the game than the debate. The home crowd was very supportive of their team. Trinidad and Tobago scored first, then the U.S. caught up, then the U.S. fouled in the box on a corner kick. Trinidad and Tobago scored on the Penalty Kick and the final score was 2-1. It's not terrible for the U.S. since they've already got a spot but now they might be put in a harder group than if they had won. Trinidad and Tobago is ecstatic. They lost to the U.S. 6-1 or something like that the last time they played so this was a big change.

Cuauhtemoc Blanco

Blanco retires from the Mexican international team after playing for seven minutes in the world cup qualifying game against Canada. (I'm trying to find the score online but half the sites I look at say Mexico won 3-0 and the other half say they only won 2-1. It's very confusing but at least the part that they won is clear) He is not quitting soccer entirely though. The 35 year old will continue to play in the U.S for the Chicago Fire for a few more years. Blanco has been hailed as one of Mexico's greatest soccer players and has scored 34 goals since is 1995 debut against Uruguay. Ever since we started watching major league soccer, he has also been one of my dad's favorite players for some reason.

Blanco was born on January 17, 1973, in the Tepito neighborhood of Mexico City. He made his Primera Division (Mexico's 1st division) debut in 1992 at the age of 19 playing for the club America. He was a member of the Mexican team that won the Confederations Cup in 1999 and was the leading goal scorer in that tournament with 6 goals. He was also part of two world cup teams, France in '98 and Korea-Japan in '02. On April 2nd, 2007, Blanco signed to the Chicago Fire and started his Major League soccer career in the U.S. 

Speaking of the US international team. They just played a qualifying match against Trinidad and Tobago and won 3-0. I was pretty surprised. We're talking about the men's team here by the way. The US women's team has been pretty good for a while now but I don't really think of the men's team as being very good. However, they seem very motivated to give a good showing of themselves so it might get interesting next world cup. I don't think they're as good as say, Brazil, Argentina or Italy but I don't think they're horrible either. It'll be exciting to see what they can do.