Sunday cup-o-American soccer: Can we go one week without talking about a lawsuit?

Happy Sunday folks. Hopefully, everyone had a good and week and is staying safe and healthy. There was lots of soccer news and stories that were really important, but we didn’t get to here on SSFC during the week. As my journalistic idol Jeff Newsroom would say: “HERE’S THE DAMN NEWS.”

Clearly, Gyasi Zardes is being robbed...

This goes for pretty much every sports league too

On the All For XI blog, Erica Ayala has an article discussing what’s next for teams in NWSL that have shown solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement. The article notes that in addition to the more visible stands that players and the league takes, things also need to change as far as having more diverse front offices, committing to allyship and anti-racism.

It should be noted, this same thing goes for MLS and USSF too along with soccer leagues around the world, governing bodies, and just about everyone. MLS is similarly promoting diversity and messages supporting Black Lives Matter, but some of its other support for social movements has stripped away political messages, for example with Pride and Earth Day, and turned them into ways marketing and revenue generating activities.

This week in Pulisic

He’s good and that’s good and it’s good to be excited about it according to Doug McIntyre of Yahoo. Meanwhile, McIntyre also reports that Gregg Berhalter had some comments about Pulisic’s progress at Chelsea compared to when he started in the fall, saying “If you watch the games, you can see the dramatic shift in how his teammates relate to him now. They actually look to him, whereas at times in the beginning you’re thinking, ‘Why aren’t they passing him this ball?’ Now, they get the ball, their first glance is to him.’” Frank Lampard’s confidence, and sometimes odd unwillingness to play Pulisic, seems to be also catching up.

The article also included a few notes about potential callups for the USMNT and how Berhalter is enjoying his time in Orlando at the MLSisBACK tournament.

More podcasts please

If you need more podcasts to listen to, a new one launched called Just Women’s Sports and it features Kelley O’Hara interviewing Alex Morgan. It might seem like several lifetimes ago, but it was just last summer that Morgan was scoring goals in the World Cup in between getting kicked by defenders. In this clip she talks about how she came up with the now famous tea drinking celebration.

US Soccer is about to be fighting one less lawsuit

The USSF does a lot wrong, but it does excel in one area - getting sued a lot. That might be changing as a federal judge has dismissed the lawsuit brought against the federation by Relevent Sports. So there, USSF isn’t propping up any monopolies, OK?

A new team with unique ownership and big goals

The NY Times has a look at the motivations and goals of the new NWSL team that will take the field in Los Angeles in 2022. The article mentions that one of the investors who brought the team to life, Kara Nortman, did so after not being able to find women’s soccer gear during the 2015 World Cup in Canada. The article goes on to discuss some of the other owners and how the team will also focus on ensuring the league grows through sponsorships and other revenue making ventures, while also paying its players a better salary.

Here’s your goal of the week