The Earthquakes and Columbus Crew combined for 25 corner kicks Saturday night at Buck Shaw Stadium, setting a club record for combined corner kicks in a regular season game. The previous Quakes record for combined corner kicks was 21, set on Aug. 5, 1998 in a match against the New England Revolution. Columbus also set an opponent’s record for corner kicks in a game and a half against San Jose. The Crew had 18 corner kicks with 11 of them coming in the second half.

Congratulations us! I think we should next focus on breaking the record for longest allowed stoppage time or perhaps the most throw-ins?

Anyways, here are some quick links of note:

* Jay Hipps reported on his blog a few days ago, “there are already discussions underway between supporters of the [Quakes and Seattle] for a special cup competition between the two sides every year.” Now, I’ve mentioned this before on this blog but I think it’s worth repeating, if Drew Carey really puts together his marching band, then I think the Quakes need to retaliate by hiring Oakland’s own, Extra Action Marching Band, to blow Seattle out of the, err, stadium. And I also think it’s worthwhile to add here that I realized a few months ago I am in no way the demographic the Quakes are marketing to. So I know my brilliant ideas will never ever see the light of day but I’m still going to suggest them whenever I can.

* Jeff Carslisle reports the Quakes will be trialling “a parade of players until the transfer window reopens in July.” Already come and gone are two Brazilians, Morelia duo Marcinho and Wanderson. Both recently played in Mexico’s second division.

* The San Jose City Council meeting to vote on the proposed sale of the old FMC site has been postponed to May 20th.

* If you are stuck in San Fransisco on May 21, there will be people at The Chieftan – 198 Fifth Street (5th & Howard) starting @ 11:30am to watch the Champions League final.

* The EPL is over, the Euros start soonish, the Champions League final is next week, the Quakes are away… what is left for this weekend? USL-2 bitches! The SF Seals home opener is Saturday night starting at 7pm at The University of San Francisco. Your Saturday is already set – watch the Quakes game then stumble up to USF for the soccer and some music. See everyone there!

Getting back to San Jose, our Quakes have a little contest going on right now. Submit an essay to soccerintern@sjearthquakes.com and explain why YOU are the biggest Quakes fan in the whole wide world. The winner gets to participate in Saturday’s coin toss. On a personal note, if I wasn’t completely burning the candle at both ends with all the projects I’ve got going on right now, I’d think up a completely ridonkulous story to submit just for laughs. Anyone else want to give it a shot?

It looks like I’m out for the rest of the day. I’m still waiting impatiently for the official “weekly update” to see who may be injured for Saturday. In the meantime, congrats go out to the Quakes who smoked Stanford University last night 3-2. No idea who scored the goals but as I understand it, the squad was made up of mostly reserves. And here are some upcoming dates to remember:

* May 13. The San Jose City Council will vote on Wolff’s plan to purchase the old FMC property. Soccer Silicon Valley is asking fans to attend the meeting to show their support.

* Memorial Day Weekend (May 24-25). Carnival Soccerfest takes place in San Francisco’s Mission District (mmmmmmm, El Farlito). It’s an interactive event to help promote soccer and athleticism for kids. There will be a free soccer clinic and a bunch of guys from our National Beach Soccer team will be in attendance.

The idea to start the San Jose The Offside blog came about after last year’s LA Galaxy/Hollywood United charity match. Frank Yallop announced he was leaving to move up north and countless blog comments followed. As the weeks went by, more rumors surfaced, yet no-one around here arrived to write about them. I think I emailed Bob a sort of “if no-one else wants to” type email. Next thing I knew, I had a wordpress login.

So I started this blog to collect all the news and rumors and silly bits I could find, which at the time, wasn’t very much. Now, with the MLS season in full swing, there’s lots of news and quite a few news sources. And I must say, these news sources do a fantastic job, so really, there’s no need for me to reinvent the wheel. In fact, I fully expect you, the reader, to check these news sources first. Then afterwards, you should stop by here, hang out, and leave a comment or two… preferably an amusing quip of some sort… a writ of wit if you will.

So what I’m getting at here is this: I feel this blog is in a bit of a transition phase so bear with me while I figure out my new plan.

In the meantime, if you aren’t already doing this, start getting into the habit of checking these sites for all your essential Earthquakes news:

Center Line Soccer – i.e. the motherlode. Jay Hipps does a regular “Quakes news articles wrap-up” on his blog while Jeff Carslile often reports breaking news on his. There’s also enough pictures and video to keep the rest of us content for days (my only gripe is, I can’t embed the video!). Oh, and former Quakes goalkeeper coach Tim Hainley does the game previews.

Soccer Spin – Often takes breaking news and presents it with that little bit extra to help put things in perspective. So new player announcements come with youtube clips and historical info. They’ve even started regular player ratings and weekly MLS power rankings. Also, every once in a while, player and coach interviews appear. I’d day this site is a work in progress as well, but hopefully it will collect an avid reader-base when it finally hits its stride.

The Bay Soccer – Their Earthquakes section is the de-facto spot to get excellent and thorough match reports. They also have great pre-season and in-season player stats charts. Their main page also plans to cover college, high school, and amateur leagues throughout the entire Bay Area.

The Quakes Section at Bigsoccer – Its like a bad boyfriend you just can’t seem to get rid of. You just keep hoping he’ll straighten himself out…

Well, I think thats it for now. Sit tight kids. I’ll be back shortly with my new plan of attack.

After days of searching and posting random queries all over the internets, I am proud to say I finally have a copy of the USWNT Olympic qualifiers game against Mexico. Now I’m off to find the Costa Rica match. Wish me luck people.

In Earthquakes news, Center Line Soccer posted new Buck Shaw stadium pictures and the Irishoutsider blog has a great Quakes preview video thats definitely worth watching (but I can’t seem to embed it, AOL video + Wordpress = disaster). Also, there are some great quotes from Cannon and Doyle in Beau Dure’s USA Today article on the Quakes. He’s also got extra quotes posted at his Netminder blog. Of particular interest is one from Lew Wolff who apparently, along with Phil Anschutz, tried to appeal that offsides rule on Thursday’s early Quakes goal. But I think my favorite is a quote from Doyle:

I don’t think we played particularly well, but I think we have good players. You look at results in the league over the first couple of weeks — Houston loses 3-0, Chicago barely ties Salt Lake and then beats New England 4-0, LA loses 4-0 in Colorado.

Yeah! Way to accentuate the positive! We are sooo gonna bounce back on Saturday.

* A special Earthquakes video on the stadium big screen (can anything top We Believe? lets all find out together!)

* The return of that blue mascot thingy “Q” (I wanna see some breakdancing!)

* The players and coaches will enter the field through a “human tunnel” consisting of a bunch of kids (crouch down guys)

* Soccer Silicon Valley will return the two MLS Cups to Lew Wolff (ok, this part is actually quite touching)

* Red Bull sky divers will land on the field to give the game ball to Earthquakes staff (is this supposed to top that jet pack from last year?)

Kickoff is at 1:30pm (gates open at 11:30am). Uh, when do all the above activities start? 9am? But I would like to add that its a relief not to have to sit through some sh*tty synchronized dance routine… unless its Sparkle Motion. Those girls bring it.

Was it me or did you get the sense that there was zero passion from the players and the crowd last night (don’t pounce SJUltras – the camera barely showed you)? Was a two year hiatus and constant Galaxy player purges enough to kill the longest standing rivalry in MLS? I swear I see loads more atmosphere when Chivas and LA play each other. And I think it was only Donovan who perked up a bit during last night’s game (I even made a comment that he only comes alive when he plays Mexico or San Jose). So its only one game and I may be overreacting here but boy will I be bummed if I’m right.

I’ve calmed down a bit and read Jeff Carlisle’s excellent analysis of our performance last night. Coupled with the positive comments from dwsharks and Alex (thanks guys), its pretty clear we need an experienced striker up front immediately. And now that the union released player salaries, we can guestimate just how much money Doyle has left to do this – or rather Carlisle can: $850,000. Seems we still have a good chunk o’ cash at our disposal. Although, I think we’re a bit tied until the next transfer window opens up. So get ready for more suckage on the pitch for the next few weeks (but I think we can clean up that backline immediately). At least the next SanHo game is here (Oaktown baby!) meaning I get to spend my day standing around in the parking lot drinking beer and eating hot dogs before witnessing the carnage. Awesome!

Frank Yallop recently sat down with Soccer 365 for an interview and offered little bit more insight into his plans for completing the roster. In a nutshell, the biggest missing piece of the puzzle is “a really good striker” and pre-season attempts to bring one over from a MLS club have proven unsuccessful. Also, he reveals he’s not against using the Designated Player slot but says: “if we can get a striker that is less expensive then fine.” So despite the season starting, the search continues meaning we may see a big trade during the first transfer window. Yallop explains:

There are no names at the moment as they are all under contract and we can get in a lot of trouble but we do have a list and we are working very hard to try and bring the right player over from Europe. So we will see what happens.

This looks like a very good plan, especially considering, besides Gavin Glinton, our forwards are a pretty raw bunch mostly overflowing with potential and not experience. And our Frank remains optimistic yet pragmatic about the season. He’s confident he’s got “a pretty good squad” but still believes “if we don’t get too many injuries” the team may make the playoffs. And this is Our Gang’s attitude going into the season and I think it may prove to be the biggest factor to their success.

San Jose will also rely heavily on Yallop’s steadying influence. The Canadian took his lumps last year in L.A., although the Quakes’ underdog role is one that fits him better than the glamour-team persona adopted by the Galaxy.

The one-time MLS Coach of the Year successfully cultivated such a blue collar attitude during his previous stint in San Jose, one that saw him turn the Quakes from a laughingstock into one of the league’s best teams.

And after reading a few of the season previews, it certainly does seem there are low expectations for our little expansion team this year. But after watching their performance during the Carolina Cup games, I still think they’ve got a shot at the playoffs. My main worry though is how easily Angel broke through the Cochrane/Garcia impenetrable wall. We’ve got more designated players this season so I expect to see those guys kill our defense over and over. And we can’t have that because then there will be less time for Joe Cannon to “kiss babies, shake hands and pose for pictures.”

So the Quakes head up to Portland on Friday for their last pre-season game against the Timbers and I should go ask Sunderland blogger and Portland resident Lucas if he still wants to guest-blog about the event. If I forget, I’m pretty sure Bob at the Timbers Offside will have a write-up on the game as well.

And your Song of the Week is my other favorite video nominated for the youtube awards (it also lost to Chocolate Rain). My car is dead but Oakland’s own Trunk Boiz know how to roll. And on a side note – just how many fans do you think the A’s are gonna lose when they move out of Oakland?