Hat tip to SF over at The Offside Rules for posting this.

2009 MLS All-Stars (Getty Images)

A lot of folks this morning are calling for the end of the MLS All-Star game, or at least the current format of it. While I am more in the ladder part of the calling I do not see this current game going away at any point in the near future after what we saw last night. In a way I honestly believe last night’s loss on PKs to EPL side Everton may have actually saved the All-Star game more than gave fuel to the fire to get rid of it.

Why do I think that? Honestly this game unlike a few of the past was the most watchable of any of the All-Star games in recent years. I know the Chelsea game was a good one and that one is definitely a close second to this one in my mind in terms of level of play and excitement from end to end. For once it actually looked like a meaningful game, rather than just a friendly.

While a loss is never a good thing to talk about, the league did showcase their talent on a national scale and losing in PKs is not the worst thing that could have happened here. Plus let’s face it, getting by Tim Howard is never easy and since he is in mid-season form rather than pre-season form it made it even tougher.

I still may not like the format of playing a club from another league for the All-Stars but last night did give me a reason to get behind the whole show a bit more than usual.

I will say that if the league continues to do a showcase game like this for their All-Stars, they need to move it up in the calendar a bit. Putting the game on at the same time as three of it’s clubs participate in CONCACAF Champions League matches is unacceptable. I guess going against some of the summer friendlies this past month was too tough to have this game a little earlier in the summer. Not to mention it would have been stupid to place it during the Gold Cup tournament too.

I still think going forward the league does need to do a better job at placing this game in the schedule. Next year will be a real challenge with the World Cup going on. My bet it will be late July once again, after the World Cup.

Thing is will it make a difference moving it to a different time of the summer? Or would we be better off without it? Some have made their claim to get rid of it due to busy summer months, while others continue to enjoy it.

Dominic Kinnear is excited for tonight, are you? (photo via MLS)

It is that time once again, the MLS All-Stars take on a club from the other side of the pond. Feel the excitement? Yeah I honestly don’t. Just like every year I get less and less excited about this game, mostly because of the set up of the league taking on a club in preseason mode. Still the league’s record against these clubs speaks for itself and they’ve done well against some solid clubs.

Tonight will not only be about those worthy (and some unworthy) of the All-Star label but about the venue for the league to showcase on national television. Rio Tinto Stadium should be a big part of tonight’s game. More than likely we will see plenty of hype surrounding this year’s venue.

Its hard to do a preview for one of these games. We know Everton is in preseason mode and are a bit cautious of the league’s All-Stars. The All-Stars also bring an interesting setup to the field. Right now we don’t know who exactly will be starting for Dominic Kinnear tonight but you can bet we will see the majority of the roster used tonight.

I think the league will come away with a result tonight that is positive. Losing the game really isn’t an option for the league, which may be part of why I don’t like this format.

What scoreline do you all see tonight? I’m going with 3-2 MLS. What say you?!

Thanks to Craig Stouffer over at The Examiner for posting this. We know now those players that are on the in-active All-Star roster.

INACTIVE ROSTER (14)

GOALKEEPERS: Pat Onstad (Houston Dynamo); Donovan Ricketts (LA Galaxy);

DEFENDERS: Jonathan Bornstein (Chivas USA); Frankie Hejduk (Columbus Crew); Jimmy Conrad (Kansas City Wizards);

MIDFIELDERS: Guillermo Barros Schelotto (Columbus Crew); Shalrie Joseph (New England Revolution); Dwayne De Rosario (Toronto FC); Ricardo Clark (Houston Dynamo); Paulo Nagamura (Chivas USA); Amado Guevara (Toronto FC);

FORWARDS: Brian McBride (Chicago Fire); Brian Ching (Houston Dynamo); Juan Pablo Angel (New York Red Bulls)

Now I know some of these guys were originally on the roster but were replaced. From the looks of it the league just bumped them down to this since they are still technically All-Stars. No real beef with any of these selections here.

For a recap of the main roster that will compete tomorrow night against Everton see below:

GOALKEEPERS – Kasey Keller (Seattle Sounders FC); Zach Thornton (Chivas USA).

DEFENDERS – Chad Marshall (Columbus Crew), Geoff Cameron (Houston Dynamo), Wilman Conde (Chicago Fire), Jhon Kennedy Hurtado (Seattle Sounders FC), Bakary Soumare (Chicago Fire)

MIDFIELDERS – Freddie Ljungberg (Seattle Sounders FC), Stuart Holden (Houston Dynamo), Cuauhtémoc Blanco (Chicago Fire), Will Johnson (Real Salt Lake), Brad Davis (Houston Dynamo), Davy Arnaud (Kansas City Wizards), Javier Morales (Real Salt Lake), Kyle Beckerman (Real Salt Lake)

FORWARDS – Landon Donovan (LA Galaxy), Conor Casey (Colorado Rapids), Fredy Montero (Seattle Sounders FC)

Weird that as solid of a season as DC United is having that they got no All-Stars and yet RSL who is near the bottom of the table has four. I know they are the hosts but you really can’t tell me Will Johnson is an All-Star this year can you?

I’ll have more thoughts on the game tomorrow.

• Pat Onstad (Houston Dynamo)
• Brad Davis (Houston Dynamo)
• Brian Ching (Houston Dynamo)
• Jhon Kennedy Hurtado (Seattle Sounders)
• Fredy Montero (Seattle Sounders) -replacing Schelotto who is injured
• Davy Arnaud (Kansas City Wizards)

Below is the full roster (including first XI, Commissioner’s pick, coach’s selections):

Goalkeeper: Kasey Keller (Seattle Sounders FC), Pat Onstad (Houston Dynamo)

Defenders: Geoff Cameron (Houston Dynamo), Wilman Conde (Chicago Fire), Jhon Kennedy Hurtado (Seattle Sounders FC), Chad Marshall (Columbus Crew)

Midfielders: Davy Arnaud (Kansas City Wizards), Kyle Beckerman (Real Salt Lake), Cuauhtémoc Blanco (Chicago Fire), Brad Davis (Houston Dynamo), Stuart Holden (Houston Dynamo), Shalrie Joseph (New England Revolution), Freddie Ljungberg (Seattle Sounders FC), Javier Morales (Real Salt Lake)

Forwards: Conor Casey (Colorado Rapids), Brian Ching (Houston Dynamo), Landon Donovan (Los Angeles Galaxy), Fredy Montero (Seattle Sounders FC)

So what do you make of the final roster? Good? Bad? Happy Beckham was left off it?

Also, Ives has a solid discussion on some rosters that could have been if MLS had not gone to the lovely format that they use now.

Today Garber selected two RSL players (the game is at Rio Tinto Stadium): Kyle Beckerman and Javier Morales.

Good picks, especially since I highly doubt either would have been picked by Kinnear and since they are the home town favorites.

Good to also see Garber not go with David Beckham. However I do have three other guys that I was kind of hoping to see in these two spots. (I’m picking three because I am assuming Dominic Kinnear may do one of the picks)

Those three are: Chivas USA keeper Zach Thornton, RSL midfielder Clint Mathis, and DC midfielder/forward Santino Quaranta.

I kind of see Quaranta getting picked by Kinnear but I was kind of hoping to see The Don go this way in his selections. I put Thornton up there since he is having a stellar comeback season this year. Mathis I thought is a little more deserving than both Beckerman or Morales here if he wanted to go with a RSL player.

What do you make of The Don’s picks? Good or bad?

Blanco was selected based on being the next highest vote-getter among midfielders, edging out Houston’s Ricardo Clark due to a high media vote count. Let me just say the league hands out a lot of media votes so it wasn’t shocking to see the Latin media vote more for Blanco than anyone else. Blanco did draw more fan votes than Clark, but Clark had twice the votes Blanco did from players and coaches/GMs.

Honestly this wasn’t a shocker to anyone who saw the voting tallies yesterday when the first XI was announced. Blanco may not be the most deserving Fire midfielder to make the roster (Marco Pappa gets my vote for that) but he will bring in some fans for sure.

Houston Dynamo manager Dominic Kinnear will fill out the rest of the roster along with two picks from MLS Commissioner Don Garber. I may have more thoughts on the two comissioner picks later this week.

Keep in mind this first eleven doesn’t actually mean this is the starting roster for the game against Everton, Kinnear will decide that.

The first XI goes as follows:

Kasey Keller (Sounders FC), Geoff Cameron (Houston), Chad Marshall (Columbus Crew), Wilman Conde (Chicago Fire); Shalrie Joseph (New England Revs), Stuart Holden (Houston), Guillermo Barros Schelotto (Columbus Crew), Freddie Ljungberg (Sounders FC), Dwayne De Rosario (Toronto FC); Landon Donovan (LA Galaxy), Conor Casey (Colorado Rapids) .

No real comments on the players picked today. Not as much ballot stuffing as once thought here from Seattle or Toronto. No RSL player in this mix so it will be interesting to see which RSL guy gets called up to the game.

What do you make of these selections?

GK: Zach Thornton (Chivas USA)
DF: Mariano Trujillo (Chivas USA), Geoff Cameron (Houston), Wilman Conde (Chicago)
MF: Paulo Nagamura (Chivas USA), Shalrie Joseph (New England), Guillermo Barros Schelotto (Columbus), Osvaldo Alonso (Seattle), Brad Davis (Houston)
FW: Fredy Montero (Seattle), Landon Donovan (Los Angeles)

I know some of my selections may be a bit off from what you may have. No doubt in my mind it was a tough selection for goal. Zach Thornton definitely got out to a fast start while guys like Kasey Keller, Pat Onstad and even Donovan Ricketts should be considered. I know it will come down to Keller getting the most votes due to the Seattle crowd but Thornton has been impressive more so to me this season after the last couple of years that he has had.

Defensively the three I selected were really without little thought. I see all making the roster one way or another.

The midfield was a tough group to select from. I really believe Nagamura deserves some consideration this year because I honestly believe he has been the biggest difference for Chivas in the midfield this season. If you see his play in person you know will know what I mean. I know his stats aren’t sexy but this shouldn’t be based on stats anyways.

I went back and forth on Joesph but in the end it came down to what he means to the Revs and everything he has done for them this season. Without him the Revs would easily be down at the bottom of the league standings with New York.

The other three (Schelotto, Davis and Alonso) should really have no arguements from anyone about.

Up top was tough. It really came down to three guys for me; Montero, Donovan and Conor Casey. Montero narrowly beat out Casey for me mainly due to the number of assists that Montero has put up this season and since Casey has missed the last month or so with the national team. That has kind of hurt him more so than helped him for this process. He’ll still be a part of the team though.

Now as for some reserves to the club a few have come to mind:

Dwayne De Rosario (Toronto),  Amado Guevara (Toronto), Marco Pappa (Chicago), Brian McBride (Chicago), Kenny Cooper (Dallas), Omar Cummings (Colorado), Jonathan Bornstein (Chivas USA), Santino Quaranta (DC United), Stuart Holden (Houston), Clint Mathis (Real Salt Lake), Bobby Boswell (Houston), Jhon Kennedy Hurtado (Seattle), Freddie Ljungberg (Seattle), and Pat Onstad (Houston).

Thankfully the league should use it’s usual 1/4 fans, 1/4 media, 1/4 players and 1/4 coachs/GMs for the voting.