Jeff Cassar reckons there would not be too much of an effect of the departure of the GM Garth Lagerwey on the Real Salt Lake Squad.

Lagerwey had been associated with Real Salt Lake as GM for a long time, but, at the end of the last season, he decided to sign for Seattle Sounders.

Real Salt Lake and Seattle Sounders are the arch rivals in the Western Conference of the Major League Soccer.

So, Lagerwey’s decision to move there did not please the Real fans that much. But, Cassar is pretty cool.

The Royals boss, though, admitted that Lagerwey was the vital cog in the team management and he had a great coordination with him.

But, according to Cassar, that’s how the professional Football works and not much fuss should be created about Lagerwey joining Seattle.

Cassar believes the new man in that role, Mr. Craig Waibel, is a great man as well with huge knowledge of the game and he can fill in the shoes of Lagerwey pretty efficiently.

Speaking in the press conference the other evening, Cassar said, “Garth and I got along pretty well. He is a great friend and it’s obvious for me to feel a little bit sad to see him going away, but, we have to move on.”

“Craig, I think, is the right person to take over the responsibility. I enjoy a good tuning with him too as we have worked together quite a bit. He is an organized man and makes his decisions pretty calmly. He knows a lot about the game.”

Real Salt Lake was three in the Western Conference table in the regular season in 2014. They trailed by 8 points to Seattle which topped that conference and later, won the Supporters’ Shield as well.

Real Salt Lake’s first game in the 2015 Season is against Philadelphia Union on 14th of March.

American international Landon Donovan brought an end to his stellar career in the best possible manner. He won his sixth MLS cup title in his final match for LA Galaxy.

Despite being only 32 years old, the forward had announced his retirement at the end of the season. He had the opportunity to go out on a high as LA Galaxy were involved yet another MLS cup final match. New England Revolution were the opponents this time around and there was a lot of belief prior to the match that LA Galaxy would give the fitting send off to their most illustrious player.

This is due to the poor record New England Revolution have when it comes to finals. Robbie Keane secured the winner in a 2-1 victory, which sees Donovan lift championship for a sixth time. He is easily the most celebrated player in the MLS. After starting his professional career back in 1999, he has represented the likes of Bayer Leverkusen, San Jose Earthquakes, Bayern Munich, and Everton. He was also part of three World Cups with the American national team, although he missed out on the 2014 edition after falling out with manager Jurgen Klinsmann. His international career saw him represent the US national team in 157 matches.

“I don’t want it to end right now. It’s been a lot of fun,” said Donovan after the win.“After careful deliberation and after many conversations with those closest to me, I have decided that this will be my last season as a professional soccer player. I will miss my coaches, at both the club and national team levels, who have helped me develop throughout my career and helped make me the player I am today,” said the US soccer star at the time of announcing his retirement a few months ago.

Phil Neville believes that his former club Manchester United needs to spend in excess of a hundred million pounds during the mid season transfer window and then, in the next summer transfer window to build a team that can challenge for the premier League title.
According to Neville, United have to find a couple of players who can play in the centre midfield and a couple of players who can play in the heart of defence.
The Red Devils were not that smart in their purchases this summer. They did splash out a huge amount of money, but, their focus was more on the attack. They signed a couple of defensive players too in the form of Luke Shaw and Daley Blind, but, both of them are inexperienced.
United had struggled in defence the previous season and thus, it was important that they looked to make that area stronger. But, they didn’t do that.
Louis Van Gaal always says that he believes in playing attacking football. But, playing attacking football doesn’t mean that you leave a hole at the back end. If you do that, no matter how good your attack is, you will always be struggling because you will be leaking goals.
When Neville was asked what United needs to do this winter, he said, “They will have to spend money and lots of that and not only in January, they will have to do that during the summer too if they want to compete for the Premiership.”
“Yes, they’ve already spent money, but, they still don’t have specialist players for every position. A good, experienced centre-half is must for them and a defensive midfielder too.”
Manchester United has conceded 8 goals in 5 league games in the ongoing season.

The American forward Landon Donovan spent 2 seasons performing as an Everton player on separate loan deals where he managed on earning the Everton Player of the Month award on 2 occasions and in this summer transfer window he was even being linked on making a return to the Premier League club.

Donovan is currently performing for LA Galaxy and during one of the latest pre-season matches for his club, he entered the pitch in the 2nd half as the MLS side suffered a 7-0 loss against Manchester United but the American attacker took the chance of voicing his emotions towards David Moyes.

David Moyes went through an underwhelming debut season with Manchester United as the club based in Old Trafford failed on winning any major trophies and considering that Landon Donovan has worked together with David Moyes some years ago when performing at the Goodison Park in Everton, the American voiced his emotions towards his former manager.

Donovan said: ’It was hard for me to watch last season, because I was pretty close to David Moyes when I was at Everton, and I was rooting for him to do very well. It was a little bit difficult to see them struggle. It’s never easy. I’m not a manager, so I don’t know what it’s like to go through something like that but, for me, David was first and foremost just a great man and a great human being. He believed in me and he believes in his players. Sometimes things don’t go your way. Sometimes results don’t go your way. That’s part of life and you have to deal with it’’

Donovan admitted that it was hard to see his former manager go through such a devastating season at Old Trafford but he is confident that David Moyes will be able to bounce back and learn from his mistakes.

LA Galaxy star Landon Donovan has stated that he is extremely satisfied the back of David Moyes at Manchester United. The former Everton manager was appointed as the successor for Sir Alex Ferguson in the summer. He came with high hopes after being given a six-year contract in what was seen a statement of intent from the club to be involved with. However, a terrible first half of the season was compounded by more misery in the second half. As a result, United see themselves seventh in the table with no Champions League football next season.

The club had to make a change in order to revive the flagging fortunes, which went to new low after the 2-0 defeat against Everton. Donovan knows Moyes extremely well after having spent two seasons on loan at Everton. This came about in two spells, which shows the high regard that Moyes had for the US international. Moyes tried to bring Donovan to Goodison Park for the third spell, but the 32-year-old rejected the move claiming that he was extremely tired.

He says that Moyes is a great manager who would have turned round the situation with more time. He also says that Moyes should not be blamed for the poor results this season.

“I love David Moyes. Not only as a manager, but as a person. He was very good to me. He brought me to Everton, and I was very hopeful he would do well at Manchester United. It’s sad to see that he didn’t get a little more time. But that’s the way the world works these days and I’m sure he’ll fall on his feet and do well. It would have been nice to give him a little more time,” said Donovan, who will be travelling with the US squad for the World Cup 2014.

About 12 months back, Landon Donovan’s international career was looking like going nowhere. He had taken some time off from the game and there were doubts whether he would be seen representing the USA national side again.

But, things changed dramatically for him last summer. He had a fantastic time with his club Los Angeles Galaxy and that gave his career a new direction. Now, he seems to be a certainty in the US World Cup squad.

But, it’s hard to tell if the 31 years old veteran would be starting the matches regularly for the Yanks in Brazil. Jurgen Klinsmann, the US manager, likes to play with just one striker and if he continues doing that in the World Cup too, it would become hard for Donovan to find a place in the starting line up. Even if he gets there somehow, he will have to play wide which is not his preferred position.

However, Donovan is a guy who has played at different positions in the past and has done well, but, he has put up his best performances playing upfront and that’s why, most of the experts want him to be utilized as a forward only.

As far as Donovan himself is concerned, he is ready to stand anywhere in the field for the sake of the team. He reckons that the uniformity of a player is more important than anything else.

Talking to the reporters yesterday, the Galaxy star said, “I am just willing to contribute for the team in whichever way possible.”

USA has to play a friendly match against South Korea in a few days’ time in Carson and it would be interesting to see at which position Donovan is asked to play in that match.

Roberto Martinez has no plans in splashing out cash during the January transfer window. The coach is going to be given a budget of approximately £10m for him to spend but it is believed that he will not be using it.

According to the reports that are emerging surrounding Everton, instead of buying players, there will be a number of them that will be seeing their way out of the Premier League club while a few of them make a return from injuries and possibly making moves for loan spells.

Aiden McGeady from Spartak Moscow is available on a free transfer which is one of the targets that Martinez is keeping a close eye on. Darron Gibson and Arouna Kone will be making a return from injuries. Landon Donovan is another player that could be spending another season with Everton on his 3rd loan spell although still nothing has been officially confirmed.

John Heitinga will be out of contract in the summer and West Ham was linked with a possible move for the Dutchman. Everton wants to sign Gareth Barry but they are planning on waiting until the end of the season before offer him a contract.

The boss of Everton, Roberto Martinez also denied any claims of selling Ross Barkley as he has no intentions in releasing him from the club even if there was an offer of £86million for the young midfielder, which is the amount that Real Madrid offloaded in order to sign Bale from Tottenham.

“Even if we got a Gareth Bale-size valuation we would never even consider it in January. Ross is an icon for us. He represents everything we are trying to do this season, so even if a stupid offer arrived in January it would never, never affect us’’. Martinez said.

It hasn’t even been a year since American international Landon Donovan took a three month sabbatical from the game in order to prevent burnout from excessive stress and playing time.

But now, it seems that the LA Galaxy playmaker will have to work overtime in order to secure his place in the United States Men’s National Team for the trip to Brazil for the World Cup next summer.

According to Jurgen Klinsmann, the national team manager, the American international players who play in the Major League Soccer must remain active during the off season of the league which begins in December after the conclusion of the MLS Cup. And the German born manager has urged players like Clint Dempsey of the Seattle Sounders, Graham Zusi of Sporting Kansas City as well as Galaxy man Landon Donovan to go out on loan to clubs in Europe to remain in peak condition.

According to the German, if the opportunity arrives for a player to go overseas, he must seize that opportunity. The main reason for such a diktat is the coach wants the players to test them out against the top players in Europe and also keep in shape ahead of the World Cup. He also mentioned that it is important for the players to understand that everything that they do now will have a bearing at the World Cup in Brazil and as a result, they shouldn’t take things easily.

He mentioned that if it were up to him, he would want all the regulars to get to play and win the MLS Cup but only few will have that chance and that is why, the others must have a plan of approach beforehand. Looks like Landon Donovan and the rest will have their work cut out to please the boss.

American midfield maestro Landon Donovan is attracting quite a lot of interest from major European clubs and according to a source close to the player; he could leave the Major League Soccer when his contract with the league runs out in December.
With the MLS trying to bring the country’s best players back to the league, the departure of Donovan could be considered very ironical as he might be leaving the MLS just months after the return to the American shores of Clint Dempsey.

A source close to the Los Angeles Galaxy midfielder stated that the player has been the centre of attraction for many European clubs and has received several offers as well and at the moment, the 31 year old is weighing up his next move and evaluating the options he has in front of him. Landon Donovan has played in Europe in several stints before, coming through the ranks at the Bayer Leverkusen academy and spent three loans spells in Europe, one with German giants Bayern Munich and two with Premier League club Everton.

With less than six months to run on his contract with the MLS, Donovan is free to negotiate with any club and sign a pre-contract agreement from outside the league. According to the source close to Donovan, several European clubs have reached out to Donovan in the past few weeks.

It is reported that having spent the last eight years in the MLS and having won any and every possible accolade in the league, Landon Donovan is considering his future away from the league and is looking for a fresh challenge in Europe. And his move to Europe will also be good enough for his career with the US Men’s National Team with the coach preferring players playing in the tougher leagues of Europe.

Los Angeles Galaxy star Landon Donovan was the star man as the United States of America cruised into the final of the CONCACAF Gold Cup this weekend and his performances for the national team has had a very unexpected result with Don Garber, the commissioner of the Major League Soccer adding his name to the All Star team of the MLS.

This is the 13th consecutive time that the Los Angeles Galaxy star finds him in the MLS All Star team, which is a record that seems very unlikely to be broken in the foreseeable future. Donovan was left out of the original team that was announced but after team mate Robbie Keane sustained a hip flexor injury playing for the Galaxy against the Vancouver Whitecaps, Landon Donovan finds himself in the thick of things once again.

Donovan has three goals as well as six assists to his name in the 13 games he has played for Los Angeles Galaxy so far this season and alongside David Beckham, was the star performer as the team lifted the MLS Cup last season in what was the Englishman’s final season of his American adventure.

He surpassed all those numbers in the CONCACAF Gold Cup, however, scoring five goals and helping seven more in assists during the tournament as he led the team into the final where they will play Panama on Sunday and are hot favorites to win the title.

Landon Donovan, who has had a brief spell on loan at Premier League giants Everton, will team up with the MLS All Stars as they get ready to take on the Italian giants AS Roma on the 31st of July, just a day before Galaxy are scheduled to open the International Champions Cup against the mighty Real Madrid in Phoenix in Arizona.