Columnist Nick Green has written 100 Percent Soccer
since 2005. A
native of England, he began writing about soccer in
the mid-1980s and in 2000 permanently exchanged a seat
in the stands for one in
the press box. He lives six miles from Carson's Home
Depot Center, home of the Los Angeles Galaxy, Chivas
USA and the training headquarters for U.S. Soccer.
Married to a long-suffering soccer widow, he has a cat
named Pele.Tuesday's Column: The Return of Ruiz (with Video Highlights)
For today's column in the Daily News and Daily Breeze I riffed on the return of a changed Carlos Ruiz to the Galaxy.
Omitted from the column for space reasons was Ruiz' penchant for on-field dramatics:
Fans loathe it to such an extent that on Saturday when Lalas addressed season ticket holders and mentioned Ruiz, one fan bluntly asked: “Did you tell him to quit diving?”The short answer is no (although Lalas acknowledged he cringes on occasion too when Ruiz dives and jokingly suggested acting lessons may be in order).
And the reason why isn’t hard to understand. As Lalas pointed out, the Galaxy come equipped with the world’s best dead ball specialist in Beckham, who can be expected to swerve in a free kick or two stemming from a Fish flop.
The questions remains, though, can Ruiz replicate the form he showed with the Galaxy the first time around?
At least he hooked up well with David Beckham on the Galaxy's recent Asian tour as the video of his hat trick in China showed.