Major Link Soccer: Explaining ECS' Tifo

Seattle

This feature has been on break for a few months, but with a recent run of winning it now feels right to bring back the "what the writers are saying" links.

Cristian Roldan has been widely praised for his terrific performance against the Portland Timbers, and the latest edition of Armchair Analyst dives into why his game was so effective.

One of the most anticipated moments in any Cascadia rivalry game is talk about the tifo, but ECS' latest entry was fairly confusing at first glance. Instead of bright colors and clear meaning, the entire stadium was apparently rickrolled. A post on the ECS website points to a protest of higher ticket prices and league demands, but the Rick Astley video playing on the stadium screens implies that the club was complicit. Either way, I'm not sure that the message was effectively conveyed.

MLS

The Vancouver Whitecaps took a loss yesterday as well, in part because of a controversial penalty kick decision that will surely be reviewed by Simon Borg. Saving a PK is hard enough without sousing through stutter steps.

A member of the Orange County Blues apparently used one of the magic words (repeatedly) against LA Galaxy's Robbie Rogers during a recent game between the two clubs. The incident, which is being investigated by the USL and MLS, is reportedly the first time in four years that someone has targeted the player, the first out athlete in the highest levels of Men's American professional sports.

All sports fans know this feel:

#FaceOfTheWeek #NEvCLB pic.twitter.com/Os09uKnWrp

— Matthew Doyle (@MLSAnalyst) August 21, 2016

World

Winning the bronze medal meant the world to the Canadian Women's National Team, writes Benjamin Massey. Canada beat a lot of talented teams to get where they went, and their window isn't necessarily closing.

Neymar wrapped up the Olympic Gold Medal for the Brazilian men, and got tattooed to be sure he never forgot ala Memento. He also gave up his captaincy, supposedly to send a message.