Starting Eleven European, World Soccer Blog Random Thoughts:

Mr. Tevez married up

Here's another edition of Random Thoughts; no I don't have anything else to write about. Deal with it.

• Um Carlos Tevez, please go away. Go play in Brazil. Go play in Italy. Go play in Argentina. Go play with yourself. You've become tiresome and a punchline. Your wife and kids don't like England, then make a call for chrissakes. Tell them to stay put in Argentina and cash the direct-deposits, or suck it up and move to Europe. Otherwise, I'm pretty much done with your whining. Play ball, score goals, make money and shut up. KTHXBYE.
• And as for you Neymar. Call me when you've done something. Is there a bigger bust in the making than this Brazilian wonder boy? the kid might have all the skills necessary to be Brazil's next No. 10, but his runaway ego and immaturity will retard all progress until he gets his requisite reality check. Get in line next to Mr. Tevez and shut up.
• How hilarious is Mario Balotelli's attempted backheel goal this weekend against the LA Galaxy. Talk about arrogance. Talk about stupidity. Talk about blatant disregard for your opponent and the people in the stands who paid good money to see your team play. And don't tell me he's just 20 and can be forgiven. No way. Roberto Mancini is my new hero for pulling this Rhodes Scholar seconds after this example of the worst kind of grandstanding. Sit down next to Tevez and Neymar and shut up; don't give Mancini lip either. You were wrong. Next.
• Hope Solo is apparently going to win my informal poll--top right--about the Women's World Cup's biggest star. I like Hope. I think Hope is America's best female keeper. But Abby Wambach, who is currently second in the poll, is the best player on that team and delivered when it mattered most. That's what stars do. Abby made her PKs. Abby scored every time the U.S. needed a goal. That's a leader. That's a legend. Hope has some catching up to do.
• Selfish time: Sporting Clube de Portugal has thrown in the towel and abandoned its philosophy of going with home-grown, young talent and has gone out and signed a truckload of foreign players to play for new coach Domingos Pacienca. They've scored a bunch of goals against a bunch of bad teams. They had their way with Juventus Saturday in Toronto. They're a threat for second in Portugal. What? Wait? I said this last year too after they blasted their way through the preseason and won that cockamamie tournament here in the U.S. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. Check in with me around Christmas time on just exactly who is the fool.
• I love the summer friendly season here in the U.S.; look at who's on tour right now in the continental 48 and Canada: Real Madrid; Manchester United; Manchester City; Juventus; Sporting; Clube America; CD Guadalajara; and Barcelona. Best part is that these teams are banging out stadiums across the country; big stadiums too. More than 50,000 for Revs-United; Philly-Real Madrid drew huge numbers as did Galaxy-Madrid. Don't tell me there isn't a hardcore soccer audience in America. We'll come for a good product. Listening MLS? Get off the franchise model; build your clubs stadiums; get on the world calendar; get rid of playoffs; integrate all your smaller leagues and create relegation and promotion. Do it.
• In breaking news: FIFA is still corrupt. ...I personally cannot wait for next summer's Euro. It's better than the World Cup, just sayin ... How much is ESPN going to hype Saturday's ManU-Barca friendly as a Champions League rematch, and how much are real football fans going to snicker ...  That said, if I had a ticket, I wouldn't toss it out of bed ...  The U17 World Cup was pretty awesome; I just may have to watch some of the U20 World Cup coming up ... Kinda pissed Copa America wasn't available on my cable network ...  Let's take a run at this: Champions of European leagues for 2011-2012: England - ManU; Spain - Barcelona; Portugal - Porto; Germany - Leverkusen; Italy - Milan. Damn that looks familiar.

6 Things We Learned from Yesterday's Friendlies

As we wrote yesterday, some international friendlies do matter. I highlighted three matches, and I think I scored better than Portugal did against Spain.

So in that vein, here are six things we learned from yesterday's friendlies:

1. Let's chill on Portugal's 4-0 curbstomp of Spain. Great win over the world champions, but it was a friendly. five months ago, Portugal had no answer for Spain's possession game, nor for the Spanish defense. If this one meant something and Spain sent a full complement to Lisbon, methinks this might have been a tad tighter. The big winner here was Paulo Bento. The new Portugal manager is the only thing that's new and shiny and different since South Africa. This is a big notch on his belt and lots of brownie points with his players, many of whom are close to his contemporaries.
2. Boy did Nani screw Cristiano Ronaldo out of a legendary goal. Ronaldo put a litany of moves out of his playbook down the left side of the Spain defense; the last guy to get burned was Gerard Pique (pick up your jock at lost and found Senor Pique). Ronaldo made himself some space and lifted a gorgeous ball over Pique and Casillas into a wide open goal. Nani, who was in an offside position but not active on the play, dashed in and headed the ball. Some claim the ball was in already--maybe it was. But either way, Nani's action was enough to prompt the referee blow the whistle and nullify the goal. Too bad. Ronaldo was pissed. Nani apologized. End of the day, no biggie.  That said, the cuffs are off Ronaldo with the national team and it's crazy how fluid the Portugal offense is. And Nani is a giant in the making; he deserved a goal on his first shot of the game.
3. As for Spain, again, chill. They're still the best. They'll be in the 2012 Euro final. 
4. England loses 2-1 to France, horrors. But the worse horror is the fact that Steven Gerrard was still in a meaningless game more than 80 minutes in, and naturally, he gets hurt and Liverpool is without their best player for at least four weeks. This kind of irresponsibility is what gives friendlies a bad name. People are already sour on the international game, and when Fabio Capello allows his ego to supercede the availability and health of his best players--who are paid by clubs--these are more black marks. Liverpool is pissed, and they should be. This is a meaningless game and managers must be responsible enough to give the biggest stars a token run and turn the stage over to emerging players. What better way to evaluate them? Huh Fabio? Fabio? Any time now?
5. Speaking of emerging players, how about the U.S.'s Juan Agudelo? The look on the kid's face--he's 17--was worth a million bucks after he scored to beat South Africa yesterday, 1-0, in RSA. He made a pretty mature run to score; he followed the play, picked his spot to pounce on a loose ball in the box before he buried high into the goal. Emotional, fantastic and just what these friendlies are supposed to be about. Play young players, see how they deal with the environment and whether they can do something positive. A-pluses all around for Agudelo and coach Bob Bradley. 
6. In case you've forgotten, Lionel Messi is the best player in the world. Now Argentina's tiny wonder played the whole way against Brazil, totally shattering my thoughts above in the Gerrard section but what the hell. His goal to beat Brazil in injury time just reinforces his brilliance and stature as the game's best player. He's got the best first step in sports--yes better than NBA guys--and the best balance. He slaloms between players, always stays on his feet--unless he's ravaged by an opponent--and usually scores when he creates his own space. His goal yesterday was genius because he doesn't have to hit a bomb of a shot with tons of effect on it to be great. He runs to space that isn't there, finds his own space and within a fraction of a second, unleashes whatever kind of shot necessary to score. Yesterday's grass-hugging roller was agonizingly slow, but equally unstoppable. He's the best. Enough said. 

Starting Eleven Friendlies: Why Some Matter

Brazil Just Rocks

International friendlies are kinda like cholesterol; they just clog up the arteries of the football season.

Most of these guys play long enough seasons that they don't need another mid-week call-up for a friendly with Slovakia. No offense to the Slovaks, but I'm all set with that. I don't want my stud defender catching a stud on the kneecap and be injured for six months.

Compounding the nonsense that is the International Friendly, particularly in 2010, is that it's a World Cup year. National teamers play full bore for their club teams, most of the good ones play in earnest through May until league titles, domestic cups and the Champions League are decided. This year, those guys transitioned right to the World Cup, which was in South Africa in case you don't remember. That's not exactly around the corner, and for added measure this year, it was cold down there.

Now most are back in full swing for their domestic campaigns and Euro 2012 qualifying, and lo and behold, here's another round of International Friendlies. Gotcha.

Most of these games suck--there, I said it. China-Lativa? Really? We need that Latvian tour of Asia in mid-November? Slovakia-Bosnia (eesh, not even going near that political undertones there). Poland-Ivory Coast? Someone's got a real f-ing sense of humor there.

Here's rundown of some that matter:

PORTUGAL-SPAIN
It's not all bleak today, however. Portugal hosts Spain today at 4 p.m. ET, the best game of the day in the last time slot. Hopefully it's a good one. Remember, Spain knocked off Portugal 1-0 in the second round of the World Cup on its way to the championship. Portugal gave Spain a decent effort, but as usual when it counts, came up just short (hmm, methinks I used to say that about Spain back in the day!).

Some interesting storylines here though: Paolo Bento gets his first crack at a "tasty" friendly and it's a chance for him to score more points with his players and the home folk. He's called up an interesting roster and it will be interesting to see what the Portugal Starting Eleven will be against Spain. Will Nani continue his fine form? Will Ronaldo step up his national team play against many of his Real Madrid mates? Which Eduardo will we get? World Cup Eduardo? Or that other guy who F-d up the first two games of Euro qualifying and got Queiroz fired?

As for Spain, they're fine. Trust me. 

ENGLAND-FRANCE
England will start Andy Carroll up front and Fabio Capello has another opportunity to prove his genius in games that don't matter. Is there any bigger disillusionment that Capello? This man turned England on its ear prior to South Africa; the team was just killing everyone in its path, scoring at will; he could do no wrong. And then they got to South Africa and the goals dried up, the imagination withered and Wayne Rooney was a shell of himself. No measure of redemption will save either until 2014.

France, meanwhile, is just the scourge of football in my opinion and not enough bad things can happen to that national team on the pitch. They can't lose by enough goals. They can't have enough mutinies to satisfy me. Thierry Henry cheated France into the World Cup and the sweetest justice was the manner in which they exited.

Here's hoping England jumps ugly on them.

ARGENTINA-BRAZIL
This one matters just because. It's the two best teams in the world with the most dynamic players and the most inspirational fans. And no Maradona. A win all around.