The 24-year old Kljestan, who was omitted from Bob Bradley’s squad that traveled to South Africa for the World Cup earlier this summer, only made his move to Europe last month.

Last Friday, he started his Anderlecht career in a strong way as his new club defeated Ghent 1-0 in the Belgian Super Cup and in the midweek, he decided to take things to the next level.

It was just the seventh minute of the Champions League clash against The New Saints when Kljestan opened the scoring, which allowed his teammates to stay aggressive throughout the night.

By the time the full-time whistle was blown, Anderlecht had comprehensively completed a 3-1 rout, securing a significant advantage ahead of the second leg.

Judging by the impressive start to his career in Belgium, one can clearly tell that Kljestan is determined to represent the colors of his nation once again after traveling as a member of the U.S. contingent in the 2008 Olympics.

As long as he continues to build on the success of the four full seasons he spent in the MLS earlier in his career, he has every chance to make a swift return to the United States starting line-up.

Former Real Madrid and new Schalke 04 forward Raul Gonzalez named his four sons after distinguished footballers Jorge Valdano, Hugo Sanchez, Hector Rial, and Lothar Matthaus.

The older brother of Bayern Munich midfielder Bastian Schweinsteiger plays in the third tier of German football.

A little over a year ago, Rafael van der Vaart’s beautiful wife – Dutch model Sylvie – announced that she had been diagnosed with breast cancer. Fortunately, a successful surgery as well as the completion of chemotherapy led to the removal of the cancer.

Everton’s Spanish midfielder Mikel Arteta is multilingual, speaking fluent Spanish, Basque, and Catalan. Furthermore, living in England has helped him hone his English skills while a passion to learn other languages has also led him to get familiar with some French, Italian, and Portuguese.

Celtic boss Neil Lennon has spoken freely about battling depression since 2000 and has encouraged other football players to discuss their problems rather than keeping to themselves.

Portuguese legend Luis Figo is an ambassador for the Stop TB Parternship – an active movement aimed at combating tuberculosis.

Arsenal’s French midfielder Samir Nasri has been in a relationship with French tennis player Tatiana Golovin for the last two years. The couple resides in Hampstead, North London.

Newcastle midfielder Joey Barton is known for his disciplinary issues in the past but little is known about his commitment to the Tamsin Gulvin Fund, which is set up to support those who are suffering from addiction problems as well as financial challenges.

Spain striker David Villa has personalized his Adidas F50 by engraving the name of his daughter Zaida on one of the boots.

England manager Fabio Capello first met his wife as a teenager on a bus. They have been married for over 40 years now.

That’s it for another week of this feature! As always, we look forward to any suggestions in regards to future editions.

Zaluska was not simply given his big break because it was pre-season. In fact, Celtic had very little time to respond when Boruc took off for Fiorentina rather than taking the flight across the pond with his teammates. Fast forward a few weeks and it doesn’t appear to be all that exciting for the 28-year old year old Zaluska as he transitions into his new role.

After Wednesday night’s disappointing 3-0 loss to Braga, where the Hoops conceded all their goals from set pieces, Zaluska came in for some criticism for uncharacteristically poor positioning. Considering that he is well-renowned for his ability to read the opposition’s attack, the Poland international was particularly held liable for completely misreading the play that led to the third goal.

Zaluska, though, has his own theories about the way the night progressed. He appears so frustrated with himself and his teammates that he has chosen to take it all out on poor officiating and, well, the Jabulani ball that first became infamous during this summer’s FIFA World Cup in South Africa.

Speaking to Glasgow Evening Times, he said: “The game had been 50/50. Braga were not a much better team and it’s very hard to take.”

He added: “I don’t think it was a penalty first of all. Then they scored from two set-pieces which was very disappointing. Something happened with the Jabulani ball and it’s very bad for keepers and defenders.”

To offer his encouragement to the Bhoys’ faithful, the goalkeeper joined manager Neil Lennon and new Celtic midfielder Joe Ledley in insisting that the tie is very much alive, especially if the SPL side can capitalize on their home advantage in the second leg.

“That was the first half and the second half comes at Celtic Park. If there are 60,000 Celtic fans then anything is possible. I just hope we can play better at home,” he stated.

The Liverpool-born teenager has been attracting interest ever since his first appearance for the League One outfit in January. However, Blackpool have reportedly stepped up their pursuit of the player only after his impressive hat-trick in a pre-season friendly against the Bolton Wanderers earlier in the week.

Just like his 15 Football League appearances off the bench, Wednesday night was no different for Eaves, who entered the game when it was still very much in balance. However, within moments of his arrival, the youngster took the nearly full-strength Trotters by surprise and before they realized it, he was celebrating his third goal.

Understandably, Oldham are expected to hold out for a higher bid for the starlet. Therefore,  The Tangerines’ manager Ian Holloway may have to increase his bid up to at least £1 million in order to secure the services of the player who is also likely to be pursued by Bolton as well as Champions League-bound Tottenham and Mark Hughes’ new-look Fulham.

Although he is only 23-years old, he has also represented Doncaster and Crawley Town in addition to loan spells at Hartlepool United and Bury. Ideally, the next step in the player’s progression will be a move from the lower leagues to either the Coca Cola League Championship or the Barclays Premier League but his contract is set to run until at least next summer.

It can be pointed out that Carlo Ancelotti fielded a side comprising of reserves, almost in its entirety. Franco Di Santo and Scott Sinclair stood out as familiar faces but it was Aliu Djalo who opened the scoring for the Stamford Bridge outift early in the game. But just when the West Londoners thought that they were in control of the game, they were punished with two first-half goals that erased their lead and placed them into deficit.

It was then Pittman’s turn to come off the bench and steal the show in the second half. To reiterate, many will feel that this was just another hat-trick scored by a lower league striker against the complacent reserve team of the Premier League champions. However, for Pittman – who has one appearance for England C - this performance will go down as an example of a developmental opportunity that he seized with brilliance.

Ahead of the first-leg kick-off in Macedonia, Hodgson had identified Rabotnicki as a difficult opposition, particularly considering that the Anfield outfit was missing a host of its starting line-up players, including skipper Steven Gerrard and vice-captain Jamie Carragher. Nevertheless, such circumstances provided an excellent opportunity for Hodgson to test the depth of his squad.

Fortunately, his team delivered early on when Ngog struck to silence the 23,000 capacity crowd. The want-away striker then scored again twelve minutes after the interval to hand the Anfield outfit the cushion that was needed to control the game. Sotirios Kyrgiakos, Daniel Agger, and Martin Skrtel were all very disciplined in the back as Liverpool outplayed their hosts the rest of the way.

Juventus enjoyed a strikingly similar night in Ireland as the Rovers never quite settled into a rhythm against the Bianconeri. Amauri opened the scoring merely three minutes into the game, taking the wind out of the Irish side’s sails. His second goal came about a quarter of an hour before the full-time whistle, sealing a strong advantage for the Serie A side when the second leg kick off on August 5.

With over 20 minutes left following the U.S. international’s header, some would say that the game was very much back on. After all, the MLS All-Stars were only 2-1 down and given the presence of a sell-out crowd in excess of 70,000, all the inspiration in the world was there to score an equalizer.

To reiterate, though, it was not the scoreline that had ruled out a comeback for the elite representatives of the MLS. It was rather the tempo that United had created thanks to youngster Federico Macheda’s early brace. The Italian forward truly exhibited his talents as the All-Star bench – including Landon Donovan and Dwayne De Rosario – was restricted to the role of shocked spectators.

By the time the duo checked into the game, even the scoreline was not anywhere near favorable. Darron Gibson had just scored a wonderful free-kick to leave the MLS All-Stars dumbfounded and Tom Cleverley added even more gloss with inarguably one of the most clinical finishes witnessed in this pre-season.

Mexican sensation Javier Hernandez also managed to appear on the scoresheet in his debut game for the Red Devils, although replays suggested he was in an offside position. The large contingent of Chicharito’s compatriots in the crowd could care less, though, as they jubilantly celebrated his chipped finish.

That is probably the way most of the audience felt at that point, despite De Rosario’s late strike to make it 5-2. That’s right, this was surely one of the most highly anticipated fixtures of the summer but ultimately proved to be quite a letdown. Such was the nature of the one-way traffic that one had no option but to react indifferently to an MLS All-Star team that has never disappointed in the last few years.

Clichy, however, insists that all the North Londoners need to set the right tone is to avoid the defensive errors that have proved extremely costly in the last five trophyless seasons. The Frenchman believes that Wenger’s decision to bolster the defense with former Lorient defender Laurent Koscielny as well the prospective capture of Everton’s Phil Jagielka will go a long way in improving last season’s tally for 41 goals conceded.

“The boss is clever enough to bring in players who will add some more to the team,” Clichy remarked in an interview with Arsenal’s official website.
 
“Of course we can always improve and that’s what we want to do. As a unit, as a team, we want to be better defensively, and we know that if we defend well we’ll attack better.
 
“We have to work, we still have a few weeks ahead of us to improve and we will see when the season starts. Like I said the feeling is good and I really hope we can do something this year,” he concluded.

Meanwhile, young goalkeeper Vito Mannone has vowed to prove himself as an improved player this season while midfielder Samir Nasri is also reportedly showing tremendous signs of growth in the pre-season.

Therefore, it comes as no surprise that co-chairman David Sullivan and new Hammers boss Avram Grant are both keen on rewarding Parker with a promise to build an ambitious team around him. On Wednesday evening, the England international inspired the East Londoners to a confident 2-0 victory over the Milton Keynes Dons, thus proving his ability to remain a key figure in the West Ham dressing room. 

Wasting no time to express his desire to hold on to Parker, Grant told The Telegraph: “We want to plan for the next few seasons and Scott Parker is a big part of this process. He is a very good player and has a good influence on the young players.

“Scott Parker is a good player. I’m sure if he was for sale that other teams would want him as well. But we are a team with ambition and we want to progress,” added the former Chelsea and Portsmouth boss.

Sullivan echoed the Israeli’s sentiments, declaring on the club’s official website: “Scott is not for sale at any price, to anyone. I made a promise that I would not sell Scott and I will not, for any amount of money, break that promise to the West Ham supporters.”

Further emphasizing the club’s ambitions to build on the efforts of hard-working players like Parker, he added: ”This is a new era. We are building a bigger, better West Ham and when we make a promise, we honor it.”

Last year, he even underwent heart surgery and as a result, he is wary of going on as a manager in the English top flight for too long. Therefore, he has set his sights on achieving as much as possible with the Rovers in the next two or three seasons before seeking a lighter schedule, which will be offered by national teams willing to bring him in as the new manager.

In an interview with Sky Sports, Big Sam stated: ”I would like to coach a national team if one came up. Another two to three years in the Premier League is about what I want to do.

“We’ll see how far we can take Blackburn – we’ll see if we can get them beyond where most people expect,” concluded the man who was also in the running to be the England boss in 2006 before the unveiling of Steve McClaren.