Well, well! Such a brilliant idea from a Mexican newspaper -- Let's whip up support for the Mexican national team by giving away voodoo dolls. Suitably dressed up in the colors of the USA, the dolls would then be available for fans to stick pins into or cut limbs off, or set fire to, or possibly blow up with semtex, who knows.

I have been nurturing a theory for a number of years now. Actually, it's more of a fear than a theory. A fear that Argentina and Brazil will run out of great players.

Let us assume that, come the end of February, David Beckham manages to remember that he is a Galaxy player, and that he bids a tearful farewell to his new AC Milan colleagues and returns to Los Angeles.

How ironic that the David Beckham fiasco should have cost Alexi Lalas his job as the Galaxy GM. Ironic because these two guys have so much in common. Both of them players hyped way beyond what their talents merit. Both of them guys with charisma and sex appeal and marketability to spare. Both of them guys carefully put into prominent positions where they could help spread the gospel of American soccer and the MLS. And both of them making a dreadful hash of things.

I shan't be getting to St. Louis, so I'm afraid the coaches' convention will have to muddle through without me. Quite possibly the organizers prefer it that way, but I have some regrets, regrets that I've managed to somewhat appease by visiting the convention online.

Over the weekend, Stoke tied Liverpool in the English Premier League, while in Spain Valencia tied Villarreal in La Liga. All four teams ended up with one point each. Statistical equality, then -- but any similarity in these games starts and stops right there.

Real Madrid, once the world's greatest club, once a classy example to everyone of how to play soccer with style seems to me to be in danger of becoming the club that everyone loves to hate.

The world of commercialized soccer really doesn't have much to say about romance. Unless you consider things like money, bank balances and profit romantic, that is. Most of us, no doubt, do not.