Major League Soccer’s DC United is aiming to be the first team to win back-to-back U.S. Open Cup titles in more than two decades. We have a preview of the title match to be played Wednesday night at Washington’s RFK Stadium.
The U.S. Open Cup is the oldest cup competition in U.S. soccer, dating back to 1914. It is open to all affiliated amateur and professional teams in the United States.
Since the inception of Major League Soccer in 1996, only one minor league team has won the U.S. Open Cup, and that was the Rochester Rhinos in 1999. DC United beat Rochester to win its first U.S. Open Cup in 1996 and last year it also beat a minor league club to win the Cup, the Charleston Battery.
But this time DC United faces a fellow-MLS club – the Seattle Sounders – for the title. This is the Sounders first season in MLS and they have been impressive both on the field and at the ticket gate. They have drawn some of the largest and loudest crowds and are in a playoff position with six regular season games left.
United played the Sounders to a 3-3 draw in Seattle earlier in the MLS season. United coach Tom Soehn told VOA Sports they are glad they are playing the U.S. Cup final in Washington.
“They’re a dynamic team, but they’re playing in our building this time, so it’s a little bit harder to play when our home fans are giving them a little home cooking [cheering],” said Tom Soehn.
Soehn says adding another trophy to DC United’s case is important.
“That’s always something that the organization takes a lot of pride in, and as players and coaches, that’s how you gauge your success, I think,” he said. “So it’s important – anytime we have a chance to play for a trophy – because everybody wants it, and only one team can do [win] it.”
DC United has been the most successful league team, with four MLS Cup titles. With a win over Seattle, it will be the first MLS team to take consecutive U.S. Open Cups.
On Sunday, Hamburg SV went to the top of the Bundesliga with a win over Cologne. In the other match, Werder Bremen claimed the third spot in the table with a win over Hertha Berlin.
Hamburg went on top of the Bundesliga with a late penalty from winger Piotr Trochowski on Sunday in a 3-1 win over Cologne.
Goals in both halves from Peru striker Jose Paolo Guerrero had put Hamburg 2-0 ahead, but Germany winger Trochowski’s late spot kick made sure of the win, to put Hamburg ahead of Bayer Leverkusen in the standings on goals scored.
The first goal at Hamburg’s HSH Nordbank Arena came after just 19 minutes when Guerrero reacted to a mistake in the Cologne defense.
At 66 minutes Guerrero scored again while Cologne’s super sub Adil Chihi shot a consolation goal on 76 minutes, two minutes after coming off the bench, but Trochowski hit a penalty in the dying moments with time running out for Berlin.
Hamburg’s victory means that Cologne, still winless, stay at the bottom of the table.
Berlin’s Pal Dardai, left, and Bremen’s Tim Borowski challenge for the ball Bildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: Berlin’s Pal Dardai, left, and Bremen’s Tim Borowski mix it up
Earlier in the day, Werder Bremen sealed up the third spot on the table after a 3-2 win over Hertha Berlin.
A pair of second-half goals by Germans Tim Borowski and Mesut Oezil put Werder 2-0 up in the German capital before Berlin’s midfielder Lukasz Piszczek pulled a goal back on 77 minutes.
Bremen nailed their three points when Oezil set up Brazilian defender Naldo on 83 minutes, only for Berlin’s Patrick Ebert to send the ball into the net in injury time, for his side’s second at the Olympic Stadium.
“We already had superiority in the first half, but we didn’t show enough purpose,” said Thomas Schaaf, Bremen’s coach. “I am happy about the result, we applied some good pressure and got the rewards.”
The defeat leaves Hertha Berlin just third from bottom of the table after their third straight league defeat in four games while Bremen trail behind Hamburg and Leverkusen with seven points.
Saturday’s games
Munich’s Arjen Robben, right, celebrates his side’s third goal with Franck Ribery Bildunterschrift: Munich’s Arjen Robben, right, celebrates his side’s third goal with Franck Ribery
After getting off to their worst start in 43 years, Bayern Munich have finally grabbed their first victory – and they didn’t beat just anyone – they trounced last year’s champions Wolfsburg.
It was Bayern Munich’s new signing Arjen Robben who made the difference. The Dutchman got his Bundesliga career off to a dream start on Saturday evening, scoring twice for Munich in their first victory of the season. The win sees Bayern pick up their first three points this season.
“It was sensational,” the 25-year old said, “coming on and scoring two goals. But that was only the beginning. I want to play here and I want to win the title. The whole team deserves praise.”
Germany’s striker Mario Gomez put Bayern Munich ahead in the 27th minute; and Munich were clearly the stronger side. But when their new coach Louis van Gaal fielded Robben at the start of the second half, the side stepped up the pressure on Wolfsburg even more.
Arjen Robben made his first appearance just one day after signing from Real Madrid. The Dutch winger opened his account in the 68th minute and was on target again 12 minutes later.
The Dutchman who cost Bayern 26 million euros gave his new club the first win of the season in four games. Only last week Bayern were humiliated 2-1 by Mainz. The win lifts Bayern from 17th to seventh in the table. Champions Wolfsburg are now ranked sixth after their second consecutive defeat.
Schalke suffer their first defeat of the season
Earlier on Saturday, Schalke suffered a 1-0 home defeat against Freiburg in what was Schalke’s first defeat under new coach Felix Magath. South Korean defender Du-Ri Cha scored the only goal of the game five minutes from the break.
Freiburg’s Yacine Abdessadki, left, Freiburg’s Du-Ri Cha, center, and Freiburg’s Tommy Bechmann, right, celebrate scoring the first goalBildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: Underdogs Freiburg beat Schalke 1-0
Bayer Leverkusen came from behind to beat Bochum 2-1 and move to the top of the Bundesliga standings. Leverkusen have 10 points after four games, three ahead of Hamburg who are to face Cologne on Sunday.
Hoffenheim secured their first three-pointer of the season with a 1-0 victory at struggling Hanover. Nuremberg held Stuttgart to a goalless draw while Dortmund settled for 1-1 with Frankurt. On Friday, Mainz were beaten 2-0 at Borussia Moenchengladbach.
Sunday’s fixtures are Hertha Berlin versus Werder Bremen while Cologne is to play at Hamburg.
Hamburg and Bremen head for Vienna, while Berlin got a date with Sporting Lisbon as the group pairings for UEFA’s newest tournament are set.
Hamburg have made a promising start to the new Bundesliga season, level on points with table-toppers Leverkusen. In the Europa League, they’ve come out of the gate even stronger, getting a thundering 8-2 aggregate win over French cup holders Guingamp.
This Friday in the Europa League group stage draw, things continued in a positive direction. Hamburg, in the highest-seeded pot, got an easy draw in Group C: Three runners-up from three weak leagues – Scotland’s Celtic, Hapoel Tel Aviv of Israel, and Austria’s Rapid Vienna.
Werder Bremen’s Naldo celebratesBildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: Naldo and Co. bulldozed the Kazakhs
Werder Bremen were also emphatic winners of their two-legged qualifier, defeating Kazakh side FC Aktobe 8-3. And they were rewarded for their good performance in last year’s UEFA Cup, in which they reached the final, with a top seed and a winnable group L.
Bremen’s opponents are Austria Vienna, third place in their domestic league; fourth-placed Portuguese side Nacional da Madeira; and Athletic Bilbao, who were runners-up in the Spanish cup, but finished a lowly 13th in the league.
Berlin lucky, too
The Bundesliga’s final representative, Hertha BSC Berlin, labored to qualify for the group stage, eking out a 4-3 aggregate win over Brondby ony by virtue of a three-goal surge in the last twenty minutes of their second-leg home match. As a club who have had little European success, they were in the third seeded pot for the draw.
Patrick Ebert riding Gojko KacarBildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: Hertha got a dramatic win on Thursday
Nonetheless, Hertha came away with a draw into Group D that they believe capable of advancing from. Sporting Lisbon came second in the Portuguese league last year and should present a real challenge, but Dutch cup winners Heerenveen could be seen as no better than on par with the Berliners and Ventspils are the champions of a very weak Latvian league.
The remaining groups are as follows:
Group A: Ajax, Anderlecht, Dinamo Zagreb, FC Timisoara
Group B: Valencia, Lille, Slavia Prague, Genoa
Group E: Roma, Basel, Fulham, CSKA Sofia
Group F: Panathinaikos, Galatasaray, Dinamo Bucharest, Sturm Graz
Group G: Villareal, Lazio, Levski Sofia, Red Bull Salzburg
Group H: Steaua Bucharest, Fenerbahce, Twente, Sheriff Tiraspol
Group I: Benfica, Everton, AEK Athens, BATE Borisov
Group J: Shakhtar Donetzk, Club Brugge, Partizan Belgrade, Toulouse
Group K: PSV Eindhoven, FC Copenhagen, Sparta Prague, CFR Cluj
New format
If that seems like a lot of groups, it is. With the transformation of the UEFA Cup into the Europa League, there are more groups and more matches.
In the UEFA Cup, groups were made up of five teams and each side would play two home and two away matches, with luck deciding who would play whom where. The Europa League group stage participants will play six matches, home and away, with each of their group opponents.HSH Nordbank Arena in HamburgBildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: UEFA will hope for a full house in Hamburg in May
The top two teams in each group, 24 sides in all, advance to the round of 32, which is filled out by the eight clubs who came third in their Champions League groups.
Play begins September 17 and continues through to the final, set for Hamburg on May 12.
FC Bayern Munich are off to their worst start in 43 years, and sit nearer to the bottom of the table than the top. To help get on track, they’re going shopping.
Once the Bundesliga’s serial champions, Bayern Munich were officially plunged into crisis after losing to newly promoted Mainz last weekend. At least that’s what the German media are saying. Anyway you slice it though, Bayern are winless in their first three games of the season.
The club’s brass, of course, is trying to put a brave face on things.
“After three matches, we have two points, and that’s not a good situation for us.” said the club’s chairman of the board, the legendary Bayern striker Karl-Heinz Rummenige. He called the situation disappointing, but not a crisis.
Supporters’ revolt
Ask the team’s fans though, and the alarm bells are already ringing.
“What’s missing is team spirit,” said one fan after the 2-1 loss in Mainz. “Of course you can lose a game, even here, but they didn’t show any energy or creativity.”
Another was more upset with the board than the players.
“They’ll say it’s bad luck, that we’re just off to a bad start.”
He added that he thought Bayern had trouble owning up to their mistakes, and this year’s bad start was down to one big one.
Ze RobertoBildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: Ze Roberto, right, plays for the boys in blue these days“I think we bought all the wrong players.”
Going shopping?
While the club isn’t ready to own up to a crisis, it may well be ready to admit to a mistake in their purchases over the summer.
Thus far, the club’s several newcomers have yet to nail down a spot in the starting 11, and the loss of players like midfielder Ze Roberto and Lucio on defense has left the Bayern side looking short-handed.
Now the club appears to be reacting as it often does when its dominance on the field is threatened – it’s getting out it checkbook.
Spanish media are reporting that Real Madrid have accepted a bid from Bayern for Dutch winger Arjen Robben. The reports say that the agreed fee is 25 million euros, which would equal the price Bayern paid for Franck Ribery two years ago. That was the second most expensive transfer in the club’s history.
Pluses and minuses
Robben’s skill and pedigree (he’s starred for both Chelsea and Real Madrid) will almost certainly improve Bayern’s talent pool. But it may also create a logjam among the team’s many big names, all of whom expect to play in just about every game.
Louis van GaalBildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: van Gaal has not yet been crowned king of BayernThe club’s new head coach, Louis van Gaal, however, earned a reputation in his native Holland as well as Spain, as something of a tough guy.
He lived up to that after the embarrassing loss at Mainz last weekend saying that while it is unusual for him to substitute players in the first half, “this time I took out two, and it could have been even more. Our performance was very disappointing.”
Digging out
It’s early days yet, and with a few good results that disappointment could turn into success. But the team’s upcoming matches promise to be tough ones.
Bayern host defending champions Wolfsburg on Saturday, and then travel to the always-strong-at-home Dortmund.
If Bayern come out of those matches empty-handed, club brass will find it almost impossible to deny there is a crisis.
Last week Ethiopia’s arch dictator was in tears, crocodile tears that is, over the unfair and shameful treatment of Africa by the heartless Western imperialists on the issue of global warming and climate change. Frothing at the mouth and brimming with moral indignation, the dictator threatened to go all out Ghandi on the West at the December climate change talks in Copenhagen. With sanctimonious and self-righteous rebuke, he railed:
If need be we are prepared to walk out of any negotiations that threatens to be another rape of the continent… While we reason with everyone to achieve our objective we are not prepared to rubber stamp any agreement by the powers… We will use our numbers to delegitimise any agreement that is not consistent with our minimal position… Africa will field a single negotiating team empowered to negotiate on behalf of all member states of the African Union… The key thing for me is that Africa be compensated for the damage caused by global warming. Many institutions have tried to quantify that and they have come up with different figures. The sort of median figure would be in the range of 40 billion USD a year.
The dictator’s sidekick on climate change, African Union chairman Jean Ping, (the longtime and one of the closest advisers of Omar Bongo, Gabon’s 42-year dictator who died recently) took an even harder line:
It is my expectation that such financial resources must be from public funds and must be additional to the usual overseas development assistance… What we are not prepared to live with is global warming above minimum unavoidable levels… We will therefore never accept any global deal that does not limit global warming to the minimum unavoidable level, no matter what levels of compensation and assistance are promised to us.
The Moral Profundity of Tyrants: Hope Springs Eternal!
It is truly refreshing to hear words and phrases that signal latent moral awakening in the “conscience” of tyrants. Use of such phrases and words as “not prepared to rubberstamp” (in contrast to a rubberstamp parliament), “rape of a continent” (in contrast to the rape of Ethiopia), “delegitimise” (in contrast to delgitimizing rigged elections), “walk out of negotiations” (in contrast to walking opposition parties through make-believe negotiations), “compensation for damages” (in contrast to compensation for damages to families of victims of extrajudicial killings, victims of excessive and unreasonable use of deadly force under color of law and victims of illegal arrests and detentions) give new meaning to the expression, “Hope springs eternal in the human breast.” Mahatama Ghandi could not have been more proud of such resolute declarations of profound moral outrage against the wily Westerners who have been exploiting Africa for centuries.
Indeed as Ghandi taught, “Non-cooperation with evil is as much a duty as cooperation with good.” Therefore, never cooperate with the malevolent Western overlords on issues of fair play, equity, and certainly environmental justice! That is the essence of the bluster of a “walk out” and “delegitimization” of the Copenhagen climate talks. Ghandi argued that the only way to get the British to abandon their evil ways in South Africa and India was to actively resist their colonial rule through civil disobedience, particularly through a campaign of non-cooperation. He encouraged Indian workers, policemen, soldiers and civil servants to go on strike. He called for massive boycotts of public transportation and English-manufactured goods. Ghandi used the moral weapon of Satyagraha (satya, meaning “truth” and agraha, meaning “holding firm to”) to campaign against the myriad crimes and abuses committed by the British colonial masters. His aim was to use “satyagraha to convert the wrongdoer, to awaken a sense of justice in him, to show him also that without the cooperation direct or indirect of the wronged, the wrongdoer cannot do the wrong intended by him.”
Remarkably and commendably, that is the intrinsic logic of the arch dictator’s outburst of moral outrage. By exposing the hypocritical West on climate change to the light of Truth and by threatening to visit moral condemnation upon them, they could be persuaded to change their evil ways. Indeed, by a resolute act of non-cooperation, the West could be held to account for its reckless abuse of nature and make Africans whole by paying them monetary damages. In short, the West could be named and shamed into doing right by Africa. But is the dictator’s pronouncement of moral outrage sincere and made in good faith? Or is it a veiled threat of naked political extortion?
Blood Money, Carbon Money and the Devil Who Can Cite Scripture
Shakespeare wrote, “The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose. An evil soul producing holy witness is like a villain with a smiling cheek.” Or a villain shedding crocodile tears? The bluster about “walking out” and “delegitimizing” the Copenhagen talks, etc., is nothing more than a cynical and beguiling appeal to lofty moral virtues to guilt-trip and shakedown Western countries into paying billions of dollars every year as “blood money”. That is certainly the conclusion of the Economist Magazine, which in its recent issue stated that the wrath of the African “leaders” is aimed at making the rich world feel guilty about global warming. Mr Meles has made it clear he is seeking blood money—or rather carbon money—that would be quite separate from other aid to the continent. If the cash were not forthcoming, the African Union (AU) might take a case to a court of arbitration and ask it to judge overall culpability for climate change. In a rare fit of African unity, it was decided at a recent flurry of leaders’ meetings that the United States, the European Union, Japan and others should pay the continent the tidy sum of $67 billion a year, though it was unclear for how long.
In the end, all of the climate change pontification is about African dictators extorting a $67 billion payola (hush money) every year to line their pockets. It has absolutely nothing to do with remedying the environmental degradation of Africa. It has everything to do with Africa’s tin pot dictators striking gold in a modern day El Dorado (also known as the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, Western donors, etc.,). They know there is a huge pot of glittering gold at the end of the climate change/global warming rainbow. Africa’s dictators are drooling — literally slobbering at the mouth and licking their chops — at the prospect of putting their grubby hands on that $67 billion delicious golden pie and sinking their teeth into it.
Save Lake Koka First Before Saving the Continent of Africa
Let’s face hard facts: Ethiopia is facing an ecological disaster! Not from catastrophic climate change (that is macro-climatic changes resulting from variations in solar radiation, deviations in the Earth’s orbit, changes in greenhouse concentrations, etc.,) but from man-made causes. Ethiopia is facing an ecological catastrophe caused by deforestation, soil erosion, over-grazing, over-population, desertification and loss of biodiversity, and chemical pollution of its rivers and lakes. Hundreds of square miles of forest land and farmland are lost every year. According to the Ethiopian Agricultural Research Institute [1], “Ethiopia loses up to 200,000 hectares of forest every year and warned that if the trend continues the country would lose all of its forest resources by the year1 2020.” Other data show that “Between 1990 and 2005, Ethiopia lost 14.0% of its forest cover (2,114,000 hectares) and 3.6% of its forest and woodland habitat. If the trend continues, it is expected that Ethiopia could lose all of its forest resources in 11 years, by the year 2020.” [2] The wild animal population is disappearing at an alarming rate due to deforestation and loss of natural habitat, and hundreds of plant and animal species are facing imminent extinction.
Dr Gedion Getahun, Research Scientist at the Environmental Radioanalytical Chemistry in Mainz, Germany writes [3],
According to the UN, Ethiopia’s forests are depleted, at present less than three percent of the entire country is covered with trees… In Ethiopia, biodiversity is treated in very awful manner. The destruction of natural habitat as well as a threat to the flora and fauna and other biological resources diminish the economy of the country. This affects the country’s wealth and with it, the existence and the well being of the nation.
The Lake Koka environmental disaster — a topic of special coverage by the Al Jazeera Network [4] — a few kilometers outside Ethiopia’s capital is only the tip of the iceberg of Ethiopia’s environmental nightmare. As one resident of the Lake Koka community put it [5]:
The main problem here is the water. People are getting sick. Everyone around here uses this water. There is no other water. Almost 17,000 people… come from 10 kilometers away and use this water. The water smells even if you boil it; it does not change the color. It is hard to drink it. The people here have great potential and we are losing them, especially the children. I am upset but I don’t have the ability to do anything. I would if I could, but I can’t do anything.
Another local resident lamented the polluted Lake Koka water in apocalyptic terms:
It is better to die thirsty than to drink this [Koka] water. We are drinking a disease. We told the local authorities our cattle and goats died due to this water, but nobody helped. We are tired of complaining.
Nothing has been done to hold criminally accountable the polluters of Lake Koka, or “compensate for damages” the people living in that community for the devastating health problems they continue to face from using the toxic water of the lake.
Almaz Mequanint, who has struggled for years to bring attention to the devastating environmental pollution caused by the Wonji/Shoa and Metehara sugar factories, wrote six years ago:
I feel helpless and in despair when I think of my whole family and the 100,000 voiceless residents who have been living around the sugar factories of Ethiopia…. I now suffer from asthma because of the air pollution at that time. My teeth are decayed and I have knee and other joint problems. My kids are suffering from tooth decay, cavities and staining.” [6]
Nothing has been done over the past six years to improve the health conditions of the tens of thousands of people who worked in the sugar factories or community residents, nor has any action been taken to “compensate them for the damages” they suffered as a result of industrial pollution of criminal magnitude. Just this past week, a website was set up to call attention to the plight of these victims. [7]
Africa’s knights in shining armor should take care of business in their own backyards — lakes, rivers and factories — before mounting their steeds on a crusade to save Africa from global warming.
What is Good for the Goose is Good for the Gander!
If truth force (Satyagrha) could be used against nasty Western rapists of Africa, there is no reason why it could not be used against the rapists of Ethiopia. Does it not logically follow that Ethiopians should “use their numbers to delegitimise” any regime “that is not consistent with minimal positions” under universally accepted standards of justice and international law such as protection of basic human rights, respect for the rule of law, free elections, free press, etc.? Aren’t Ethiopians entitled to resist anyone who “threatens to (perpetuate) the rape of” their country? Are they not entitled to “field a single negotiating team empowered to negotiate on behalf of all” the people against a one-man, one-party dictatorship? Is it not true that what is good for the goose is good for the gander?
Doesn’t it make more sense to save Lake Koka FIRST before saving the whole continent of Africa?
Ethiopian Airlines’ “new” Boeing 737-8AS ET-ANB (msn 29935, ex EI-CSW) is pictured at Lasham before it departed on September 13. [Photo: Antony J. Best]
Ethiopian Airlines operates an all-Boeing fleet of 737 and 767 aircraft.
Last week, Ethiopian Airlines, it acquired its second MD-11 freighter aircraft from the Chicago-based Boeing Corporation.
The airline Management told Business Times that the newly leased aircraft with a payload capacity of 95 tons, 32 pallets and a volume of 513 cubic meters will increase capacity 23 percent following the Airlines code share agreement with Rwandair.
Management said the aircraft will help them serve the newly established markets of Europe and South-East Asia. Currently, Ethiopian airline has a total a fleet of six aircrafts consisting of two, B757-200, two, B747-200 and two MD-11F.
