Galaxy Face Suwon for Pan-Pacific Championship

By: jen | February 21st, 2009

Should I be taking this seriously? If you beg to differ, please do. But this is how I see it:

“Hey! Let’s get a bunch of professional teams from separate, Pacific-ish countries, and have them play the Galaxy because they have DAVID BECKHAM! Except this year they don’t have David Beckham but that’s okay because they still “have” David Beckham and yay! a trip to the states! With all the money coming in from sponsors and television rights we’ll be able to pay, like, $100 per player for the winning team! What’s not to like???”

What I am interesting in seeing, however, is how Arena is putting together this year’s team. I was eager to see the old new, and young new players work together on the field and get a feel for their talent and chemistry. Wednesday’s match did not disappoint.

My hope is that Suwon is a more formidable opponent than Oita Trinita *insert snoring sound*. I’d like to see the defense truly challenged with Sanneh and Gonzalez in the center and Dema Kovalenko being his bad-ass self at defensive midfield.

I’ll be back later tonight with line ups and comments. I don’t know that I’ll be able to live blog this one, but I’ll see you in the comments.

Galaxy line up:

Josh Saunders (G), Sean Franklin, Omar Gonzalez, Tony Sanneh, Eddie Lewis, Chris Klein, Dema Kovalenko, Miglioranzi, Ely Allen, Jovan Kirovski and Alan Gordon.

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Category: Player News

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Justin

One other thing from this game Ely Allen is clearly not ready to play in this league! We need to take some of these guys and loan them out to USL teams now, that way we do not have to cut them all.
jen

Poor Franklin. He is very much off form right now. Hopefully, his bad news comes in threes and it's over now (own goal, yellow card, red card).

Diane, I'm with you on Klein. Whether or not he is the "official" captain, he is definitely a leader on and off the field. He actually looked a little pissed at Kovalenko when he gave him a shove away from the ref.

And Nathan? You get all the cool points!!! Blogging from the stadium rocks! It's almost like we have our own man inside the press box! (Hey, maybe you could work your way up there? . . .)
Justin

Nathan the red card should not have been a red you are right but if it was a yellow it was his second yellow so...either way this was the worst game Franklin has played on this team. He made more than two of those types of tackles so it is his own fault and I agree I think he is rusty I mean this was only his second game of the pre-season.
Diane

HANG ON! Eddie Lewis is captain and not Chris? Eddie seems like a great guy and we know he's a good player, but I thought Chris was going to be captain next -- of anyplace he happened to be at the moment for that matter.

The alleged Chris Klein fan club can arrive none too soon!

(Fair enough, Franklin deserves more sympathy, but still..)
Laurie

George, when I was in Europe last year, the system would tell me that everybody else was wherever I was. So you guys all traveled with me to England, France and Ireland. Hope you had as much fun as I did! :-)
George

Interesting how on the live blog for the game against Trinita it said that a lot of commenters were from Japan, and here it tells me that Justin, jen, and David are from Republic of Korea.
Laurie

Heartbreak, but it could have been worse? I do feel sorry for Franklin, though.

Methinks Bruce will be working the guys on penalties. Suwon looked a whole lot more self-confident in that shootout.
David

I only saw the last 20 minutes. Hard to judge from that. I didn't recognize a third of the team. Franklin was clearly awful. Overall though the team seemed a better than last year, more in synch. How was the lineup?
Nathanhj

Mike Magee!

Soft penalty call. Guess the ref is in pre season too.
Nathanhj

Extremely soft red card. Absolutely a foul. Maybe yellow. Hard to justify red.
Nathanhj

Franklin looks rusty.
Nathanhj

Not that impressed with Kirovski yet. He's got a month to get there, though.

Missed the Duni injury.

Magee's looked very sharp since he came in.
Nathanhj

Mike Magee!
George

Nathan, Duni's injured. I really like Kirovski and his intelligence. How about using Donovan as our playmaker and using Buddle and Kirovski up top?
Nathanhj

Also i'm being extra cool and commenting from my work-issued smart phone.
Nathanhj

Wow. I can safely say that we have not found our midfield playmaker answer from this bunch.

Also that looked bad for Eddie. Hammy from the way it looked from section 232.

Can we please see Duni somwtime? Why put Eddie in there when he's definitely better than any other left wing option?

I think the only Galaxy game I've seen that is more boring was last year's PPC game I caught.
jen

I loved Klein shoving Kovalenko back to his position and away from his umpteenth conflict with another player. :)
jen

Justin, you mean it was even more of a yawner in person? Better have a few beers tonight -- or maybe not if you're trying to stay awake.

Since the stands were so clear on Wednesday I was regretting not asking you to give a shout out during the game. If you're game, give a try tonight. :) I could definitely hear the one guy with the farking horn (hope that wasn't you), and another guy who hit the beer at half time.
Justin

Well I will be at the game tonight and will report back tomorrow or tonight with my thoughts from the field. :) I am re watching Wednesday's game right now lol and it does not seem as bad on the TV as it did being there, just finished the first half. Dema is a Bad Ass M F'er though!