Stories Of the Day: Dark Clouds

Red Bull Lite: It is a good thing the Red Bulls found its offense of late. It will surely need it to be highly-caffeinated for a while with more bad news at the other end of the pitch. First there was concern over Wilman Conde’s health, which has sidelined him for, at least, this weekend. Now, it turns out a knee injury suffered at training Thursday by Teemu Taino, who impressed in his last outing, will cost him 4-6 weeks.

Nice Threads in Minnesota: Clubs unveil special jerseys all the time, usually with some unique color scheme or patch on the sleeve or chest. In Minnesota, however, the club announced a true first for North American soccer – a literal tribute to its fans.

“They are unbelievable. The away kit that we’ve done this year is something that I don’t think anyone else in the country, maybe even in the world has done before,” said team CEO Djorn Buchholz prior to the unveiling in a Q&A with local writer Jon Marthaler.

Djorn is right, though the home fans will not see them in the Opener Saturday at the Metrodome. The special jersey is the club’s away jersey, which is adorned with the motto, “Everywhere We Go… Dark Clouds Follow.” The saying is in tribute to the club’s supporters group, the Dark Clouds, whose name was derived from the former club name, Minnesota Thunder.  The away jersey’s unique feature though is the jersey numbers on the back. Instead of being the typical solid color, the filler of each number is made of a the Dark Clouds in match-day celebration. 

Interesting Stories: Michael C Lewis of the Salt Lake Tribune has a good story about the new wave of coaches in Major League Soccer. Not only are they younger, but many of them are players with lengthy history in the league.   Scott French writes about the slow start of the LA Galaxy and how there is plenty of time, something coach Bruce Arena points out, laughing about how seriously everyone is taking their struggles thus far. Question is, is it really a laughing matter?