Birthdays of Note: Who was the last defender to win the Ballon d’Or? The question’s not that difficult because it wasn’t that long ago. Fabio Cannavaro, after leading Italy to the 2006 World Cup, beat out teammate Gianluigi Buffon and Arsenal’s Thierry Henry to win world player of the year. Today, just over one year after retiring from professional soccer, the former Juventus and Real Madrid star turns 38.
Big Important Story of the Day: We still have little idea how much the Hillsborough Independent Panel’s report will ripple through English society, but on Thursday, we’ll get a better idea. Yesterday we saw the initial shock (and, more often than not, disgust). Today we’ll likely get a clue as to the implications, including possible civil action against those who perpetrated the fraud.
Ahead on the blog today*: If it’s Thursday, then we’re bound to hear from Mr. Noah Davis, who is in Portland ahead of Saturday’s big game.
RASNoD (Random American Soccer Name of the Day): Anson Dorrance, though given he was mentioned in a post last week, the name’s not so random.
Twitter daps: Some remnants from Tuesday - thoughts that trickled in throughout the last two days:
PST background noise while blogging today: For so many people, it’s the last thing they do each day. For me, it’s part of the morning ritual. The Daily Show’s playing on one monitor, but since the show’s on hiatus this week, I’ll just have to be content with a re-run.
We’ll leave you with this: International breaks are a nice change of pace, but it’s going to be good to have the day-to-day rhythm of the club scene back, including a full slate of Major League Soccer action (with two games on Friday). There’s still nothing quite like a U.S. national team matchday, but that three-day span between matches? When there’s no other soccer happening? Just put us out of our misery.
*Always subject to change; you know how it is