August Catch up with Beckham

Apologies for the delay over posting, I have been away without adequate access to the internet to even keep myself updated let alone my visitors...

Let's Recap the salient points over the last few weeks:

25/08: LA Galaxy beat Costa Rican champions Alajuelense 2-0 (CONCACAF) at the Home Depot Centre, goals from Gonzalez (from a Beckham corner) and Barrett (from a move begun by Beckham). Unfortunately, Beckham picked up yet another yellow for delaying a restart - which must make him at least one of the most booked players of the season?

05/09: LA draw away to Kansas City 2-2 - a brace from Sean Franklin in a scrappy game that saw LA lose the advantage twice. Kansas were unlucky to have a goal ruled out for offside, but then lucky to get a penalty in the final minute for handball. Beckham gets another yellow and another assist, both Beckham and Donovan are closing in an an automatic ban - I think this will be Beckhams second of the season.

Next LA Galaxy game on Friday against Colorado at the Home Depot Centre..

Meanwhile England have been performing well in the build up to the European Championships, beating Bulgaria away 3-0, a young England are looking like they could easily off-load experienced players such as Lampard and Gerrard let alone Beckham and replace them all with fresh faces. This is an exciting time for England who face Wales tonight, however a successful qualifying run-in does not guarantee a great tournament as we well know. Meanwhile Robbie Keane had a disappointing return to international football missing a penalty in a draw with Slovakia. The Republic play Russia tonight in Moscow.

LA Galaxy 2 San Jose Earthquakes 0

Robbie Keane scores in his debut for The Galaxy, an immediate contrast to the ineffective Jaun Pablo Angel who The Galaxy have released to Chivas.

Just half-way through the first half, Beckham lofted a free kick beyond the San Jose defence and into the path of Keane on the run. Keane easily fooled the keeper, took a step beyond him and slipped the ball into an open net. This was after a high tempo start by The Galaxy, keen to build on the fortress mentality at the Home Depot Centre.

Robbie Keane played about 70 minutes in his first outing, but the second half still had drama to unfold, Steven Beitashour of the Earthquakes stamped on Donovans knee after being tackled and was red-carded. On 90 minutes, Mike Magee scored again for The Galaxy making the final score 2-0.

LA Galaxy 2 CD Motagua 0

CONCACAF Champions League Group Stage, Round 1 - Galaxy play CD Motagua from Honduras.

Right from the start, The Galaxy were pressing the visitors and were rewarded with an early goal on 13 mins from Cristman, sliding in to convert DeLaGarza's cross. There was a lot of action from The Galaxy with little response from the Honduran side. However, the first half finished with just the one goal advantage to the home side.

The second half saw a resumption of attacking play from The Galaxy who had a hat-full of shots on target - it was the 60th minute when Beckham feinted on the right to go past a defender, the resulting cross fell to Donovan with plenty of time for him to tee up and smash the ball into the net.

Motagua tried their best to get back into the game, stretching Galaxy 'keeper Josh Saunders who was called on to save with his trailing leg twice in quick succession. Despite the best efforts of the visiting team, it was Galaxy all the way and they finished the game in firm control.

With the exiting news that Robbie Keane is about to join the line-up, The Galaxy are looking stronger than ever - I strongly suspect that Keane will be viewed by many as a replacement for the disappointing Juan Pablo Angel.

Galaxy 3 Dallas 1

The Galaxy looking to steady the ship after a rocky midweek game against Portland Timbers sees Beckham provide three assists one for each of LA's goals.

Angel was left out of the starting line-up, eventually joining the game for the last 15 minutes - to say his form this season has not met expectations is an understatement. It looked like the rot of conceding goals had set in when Dallas struck first in the 9th minute, a great curling left-foot shot completely evaded Josh Saunders and nestled in the top left corner. 1-0 down was not the planned way for this game to start. It took The Galaxy 20 minutes to draw level when a Beckham free-kick was missed by the keeper and Gonzalez latched onto the free-ball for an easy header home. The first half ended in a 1-1 draw.

After 15 mins of the second half, a Beckham free-kick close to the corner flag skidded off the head of Berhalter falling kindly at the feet of Juninho - somehow his shot squirted through the bodies in the box for goal number two for The Galaxy, 2-1. The Galaxy were benefiting from set-piece plays and Beckhams corners were having a telling effect. On 80 minutes MaGee latched onto a Beckham corner and the resulting header left the 'keeper with no chance, 3-1 to The Galaxy and normality is restored...

A break of 10 days until they play CD Motagua in the 'Champions League', two weeks 'til the next MLS game against The Earthquakes...

	Club	PTS	GP	W	L	T	GF	GA	GD
1	LA Galaxy	48	25	13	3	9	35	20	15
2	FC Dallas	42	24	12	6	6	31	24	7
3	Seattle Sounders FC	41	24	11	5	8	35	27	8
4	Colorado Rapids	37	25	9	6	10	35	31	4
5	Real Salt Lake	36	21	10	5	6	30	16	14
6	Chivas USA	29	23	7	8	8	30	26	4
7	Portland Timbers	26	22	7	10	5	28	35	-7
8	San Jose Earthquakes	25	23	5	8	10	25	30	-5
9	Vancouver Whitecaps	15	22	2	11	9	21	34	-13

Timbers 3 Galaxy 0

The Galaxy took their unbeaten record to Portland only to have it convincingly taken from them in unexpected style.

Two goals in the space of seven minutes stunned LA before the break, a follow-up goal half-way through the second half sealed the game for Portland, a gap in performance wide enough to make the casual observer wonder which of these two team were currently at the top of the MLS.

The Galaxy didn't even get a shot on goal in the first half as Portland found the answer to The Galaxy's attacking moves.

Hopefully, this is a one-off glitch in the LA Galaxy assault on the Western Conference, and normal service will be resumed at the weekend?

Vancouver Whitecaps 0 LA Galaxy 4

This is the first time that these two teams have met, this being the first season in the MLS for Vancouver. For this game, Beckham is left at home for this game as once again, the accumulation of yellow cards means he misses another league game.

In other team news, Josh Saunders starts once more in goal for the Galaxy standing in for the injured Donovan Ricketts. Angel starts this match with support from Landon Donovan as The Galaxy seek an away win over bottom-of-the-table Vancouver.

The first half was fairly even-handed with neither team establishing a foot-hold in the game despite a flurry of chances for The Galaxy near the end of the half.

It was an hour into the game before the deadlock was broken, a great searching pas from Franklin found Donovan, a defender slipped the the ground leaving Donovan unchallenged shooting across goal with his left foot - a great hit proving to be his 10th goal of the season, this was quickly followed up with a penalty, also scored by Donovan.

Donovan sets Franklin up for LA's third goal, a last-minute effort from Cristman sealed a convincing win, 4-0 to The Galaxy, who are having a great season so far.

MLS All-Stars 0 Manchester United 4

Following on from their 7-0 drubbing of Seattle Sounders, Man U took the MLS All-stars to task yesterday. Beckham took a midfield role as he does for recent Galaxy games and was able to drive forward a couple of times once striking just wide, and another time testing the keeper from range. However, as Man City over-ran The Galaxy last week (even though they only managed a 1-1 draw before penalties), there was never any doubt that Man United were the superior team. It was Anderson who opened the scoring after 20 minutes. Park doubled the advantage with a superb individual effort before half-time.

Goals from Berbatov and Wellbeck in the second half ensured an emphatic victory for Man United, establishing proof of the gap between the top of the English Premiership and the top of the MLS.

LA Galaxy 1 Manchester City 1 (6-7 on penalties)

David Beckham went on record this week accusing Manchester City of trying to 'buy' their way to the top, contrasting with the Manchester United story of consistent performance over a long top-flight history. Later this week, The MLS All-Stars with Beckham amongst their number will get the chance to show their class against Manchester United, today Manchester City get the chance to show just what they have in the squad although it is unlikely that at this point in the season, The Galaxy will be in a position to field their first choice squad for ninety minutes.

The first half was dominated by Manchester City as they easily controlled the majority of the play - after 20 minutes Balliotelli converted a penalty for Man City as Micah Richards was brought down in the area. However just a few minutes later Balliotelli found himself substituted by Mancini after outrageous 'showboating' in front of goal. His offence was to turn his back on the LA keeper when clear in the penalty area and try (unsuccessfully) to back-heel the ball into the net. The crowd, the opposition and even team-mates were equally appalled, and Balliotelli was in no doubt that he had offended his manager when he was called to the bench and removed from the game (I believe he was also booked for his petulant display). Balltiolli is living proof that you can give a child a mans' wages, but it doesn't mean he will grow up - Premier League fans are used to his bizarre behaviour, he apparently has not matured.

Beckham played most of the first half as a make-shift left-back, and with the All-star game looming, was not expected to come out for the second half.

Man City go into half time one-nil up, and the second half appeared to be a continuance of the first, until 52 minutes when A MaGee strike from distance soared over Joe Harts head for a spectacular LA goal. This inspired a frantic 5 minutes for LA when they pressed the Man City goal until they regained composure and possession. The second half looked a lot more evenly balanced even with some key LA players missing, and a debut for 16 year old Jack McBean up front.

LA hold on for the rest of the ninety and the game ends at 1 - 1 in normal time - penalties to follow...

After 2 clean penalties each, Juninho hits the post for The Galaxy - but Perk saves the last and final penalty of the initial five. Jack McBean has his penalty saved, but Lescott for Man City has a penalty saved by Perk too. Gonzales gets a goal despite Joe Hart getting a good hand to it.. We are up to the ninth round, and Hart saves from De Le Garza, Joe Hart himself takes the ninth penalty for Manchester City and smacks the ball with some venom past his counter-part Perk. Man City take the points...