CZECHO’S SOCCER CORNER

According to the Italian media Jose Mourinho is heading for Inter Milan as their new coach. He would replace Roberto Mancini who was fired Thursday despite winning the Serie A title with the club. Mourinho who quit Chelsea early last season will be officially introduced as Inter’s new coach next week according to unnamed sources.

Several South American teams visited the US for a couple of friendly matches. El Salvador tied Guatemala in front of 39,000 fans at Washington D.C.’s RFK Stadium. Fort Lauderdale saw a 1-1 tie between Venezuela and Honduras. Venezuela traced behind till the 77th minute, and then tied the match on a penalty kick.

Sven-Goran Eriksson’s appointment as new coach of Mexico, worries some of their top stars. Players like Carlos Salcido or Jared Borgetti question Eriksson’s knowledge of Mexican soccer and would rather have a Mexican born coach. They also worry about being able to communicate with the coach since not too many players speak English.

FC Barcelona will make their third trip to the United States this coming summer to play a couple of friendlies. Their first match will be in Chicago against Mexico’s Chivas Guadalajara on August 3. The second match is at the Giant Stadium with the NY Red Bulls on August 6. Barcelona is one of several top European clubs coming to the US to promote the game of soccer.

The Women’s Asia Cup saw Japan demolish Taiwan by an “ice hokey” like score of 11-0. Japan lost the first game to South Korea and Australia beat Taiwan 4-0 in their opening game. Australia is schedule to play Japan in their last group match, which should decide if Japan will qualify to the last four.

Brazilian player Edmundo announced he will retire a year earlier than he was planning to. He missed a crucial penalty the other day and admitted he is no longer capable of handling this kind of emotions and decided to retired. The 37 year old Edmundo who played for clubs in Japan, Italy and Brazil also represented Brazil 42 times, scoring 12 goals.

The FIFA Club World Cup 2007 tournament saw its first big surprise yesterday when the favorite Mexican team Pachuca lost to Tunisian champions Etoile Sportive du Sahel by a score of 1:0.

Pachuca was the dominating team and the Tunisians managed only two shots on goal in the first half by they teenage star Mohamed Amine Chermiti. Pachuca showed the same dominance in the second half and they even scored a goal which was disallowed because of offside. Then with just five minutes to go to the end, Moussa Narry hit a deflected ball and scored the only goal pushing the Tunisian team into the semi-finals, were they will meet the South American powerhouse Boca Juniors from Argentina.

In the other quarter-final game Japan’s Urawa Red Diamonds beat Sepahan of Iran 3:1. This decisive victory means that they are going to face star studded AC Milan.

Urawa, with huge support from local fans, were the better team through the whole game, scoring the first goal in the 32nd minute and adding another one in the second half. Then Iranian team scored its own goal and that pretty much killed off the game.

Sepahan was hoping to avenge the defeat they suffered in last month’s Asian Champions League final, but Urawa was just too much for them to handle. According to Sepanah coach Luka Bonacic one possible reason for their poor performance could be the fact that the team wasn’t 100% healthy. Most of the team players came down with the flu virus since they arrived in Japan last week.

You can watch both games on Fox Soccer Channel, for US viewers only.

Wed. 12/12 Boca Juniors–Etoile Sportive du Sahel 5:00 am EST

Thu. 12/13 AC Milan–Urawa Red Diamonds 5:00 am EST

Czech international Milan Baros broke a ” speed record” in the French province of Pont-d’Ain by doing 170 mph in an 80 mph zone. Police confiscated his Ferrari 430 Coupe and Baros who had to take a taxi home is facing heavy fines and a 3 years driving ban.

Arsenal’s Emmanuel Adebayor reveled that he was approached by Man Utd about signing with them. He said he was flattered by the whole situation but he said he is already with one of the best teams in the world and chose to stay there.

Chicago Fire advanced to the Eastern final on 3-2 aggregate win over D.C. United on Thursday. The D.C. United team came close to winning the game after scoring 2 goals in the second half and having one goal disallowed because of foul.

On the opening day of the FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup US lost to Spain.The game was tied at 4 goals a piece when Spain scored 4 goals within three minutes and winning it 8:4.

The former captain of the Colombian national team Carlos Valderrama had to be escorted off the field after he verbally attacked the referee Oscar Julian Cruz who called a penalty against Athletico Junior where Valderrama is assistant coach. The incident started a riot when Junior’s fans attacked visiting supporters of America of Cali with sticks and rocks.

South Korean Football Association handed down tough penalties to four Korean players for drinking and visiting a brothel during the Asia Cup tournament. Those players were banned from the national team for one year and will have to do between 40 to 80 community hours.

Heated arguments had erupted after the Red Devils booked their tour of the Asian Continentat the same time as the Asia Cup. But after talks, the Head of the Asian Football Confederation says that the wrinkles have been ironed out and feels that the AFC and European Clubs have a better understanding and will get along.

Read More: Yahoo Sports: No more conflict with European clubs, AFC chief says