The inclusion of Atlanta’s own Ricardo Clark to the 23-man U.S. World Cup roster was no surprise, but some of the other picks by coach Bob Bradley that were unveiled Wednesday did send some shock waves through the American soccer Tweetosphere.

No Brian Ching or Eddie Johnson up front, but Edson Buddle and Robbie Findley are in. So is Herculez Gomez, who scored in Tuesday’s 4-2 friendly loss to the Czech Republic.

No Chad Marshall or Heath Pearce in the back, but Clarence Goodson. And Oguchi Onyewu, injured most of the season for A.C. Milan (remember his formal introduction at the Georgia Dome last summer?) and who saw his first action in seven months last night.

In midfield, DaMarcus Beasley is in after nearly falling completely out of favor several months ago. Out are Sacha Kljestan, who was a borderline case for making the team, and Robbie Rogers, whom many pundits thought would be included.

In reality, Bradley didn’t have many options with injuries, including Clark, who got in a few games at the end of Eintracht Frankfurt’s season in the German Bundesliga. Speedy forward Charlie Davies was ruled out of the World Cup because of a long recovery following a near-fatal auto accident.

Before he got hurt, Clark was featuring plenty as the U.S. starting midfielder (along with Michael Bradley, the coach’s son). But the return of Maurice Edu adds to the decisions the elder Bradley will have to make about his regulars, and especially his lineup in the June 12 opener against England.

Defensively is where the U.S. looks particularly vulnerable, Onyewu’s fitness aside. The mistakes in the back against the Czechs can’t give Bradley much confidence at all. Tim Howard will have to be nothing short of amazing in the nets.

Up front, Landon Donovan and Clint Dempsey are absolutely essential for the U.S., and big striker Jozy Altidore, who has shown some promise, needs to start living up to it. He and Davies were starting to click before that terrible accident, and Bradley has tried to compensate for the loss of Davies’ speed with Findley and Gomez.

On paper, this team may not be any better or worse than the 2006 team that crashed out of Germany in the group stage. The group in South Africa doesn’t appear to be as difficult, but the Americans can’t afford to assume anything about anybody they play.

In this segment that introduced the players ESPN’s Bob Ley didn’t ask Bradley any questions about whom he left out of the roster, but here are some later explanations from the coach about his final decisions.

The Atlanta-based World Football Insider site has already begun digging into the various World Cup bids for 2018 and 2022 that were submitted earlier this month to FIFA, and thus far the initial analysis indicates a fairly tight race at the top.

England, Qatar, Russia and the U.S. were neck-and-neck in WFI’s World Cup Bid Power Index, which reveals a thorough, detached method to assess the strengths and weaknesses of every bid.

The Americans rate strong in transport/accommodation and relationships with FIFA members, which figure to be two of the biggest factors of all. Not so strong is the “wow” factor, and the analysis does explain that expansive travel issues could be a drawback:

“The US bid’s transport system is one of the best but the distance between cities and venues raises questions over whether they would be able to fill stadia for low-profile World Cup matches.”

One of the centerpiece arguments of the Atlanta bid group is the primacy of Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, and it figures into a proposal to have the city become the venue for an International Broadcast Center should the U.S. land one of the available World Cups.

Here’s a video from the official USA Bid YouTube page of all the bidding cities, with Atlanta leading off:

With Europe (likely England or Russia) likely to get the 2018 World Cup, the battle for 2022 figures to come down to the U.S., Qatar and Australia.

If your first reaction about the Qatar bid is to question its viability, check out this video of the first five proposed stadiums, which are fully air-conditioned but open-air. They’re almost as visionary as the Middle Eastern nation’s audacious attempt to land the 2022 World Cup.

More facilities would have to be built and the biggest question is whether Qatar is big enough to have a 32-team tournament, but the idea of FIFA extending its political and commercial reach into the Arab world by staging a World Cup there is what makes international soccer politics so unpredictable. And intriguing:

(h/t Cloudspark)

The Atlanta Goethe Institute is celebrating the World Cup with a month-long soccer film festival starting Wednesday and that is open to members and the general public.

The series kicks off with The Miracle of Bern, the story of Germany’s first World Cup championship in 1954, the first year Germany was invited to compete after World War II.

Cost for each film session is $5 for non-members.

The organization is also sponsoring the German Street Soccer Cup slated for June 26 in Sandy Springs. It is open to boys and girls ages 12-16.

The Goethe Institute is located at 1197 Peachtree Street, in Colony Square. For more information call (404) 892-2388 or visit the institute’s website.

Arthur Blank’s stated preference for a downtown outdoor stadium for the Atlanta Falcons — without a retractable roof that he says is too costly — is catching some flak for more than just that reason, and not just from the folks at the Georgia Dome who risk losing their primary tenant.

As my former AJC colleague Tony Barnhart wrote this morning, without a weather-proof venue, Atlanta risks losing a lot of events that have become a vibrant part of the city’s sports scene.

The Falcons owner and team president Rich McKay point out that an outdoor facility with natural grass is optimal for soccer, and it should be heartening to the Atlanta soccer community that the Falcons’ soccer interest remains strong.

Blank is harboring long-range hopes of landing a Major League Soccer franchise, dependent on a new facility for his NFL team that he has wanted for years. And MLS commissioner Don Garber recently reiterated the league’s desire to have Atlanta on board.

A new Falcons stadium also has been included in the Atlanta venue component as part of the U.S. Soccer Federation’s World Cup bid submitted to FIFA last week, with the Dome as the ready-to-go option.

The Atlanta stadium tussle figures go on for some time, beyond the December deadline for FIFA’s decisions on selecting host nations for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, minus final venue choices.

The threat of not getting an MLS team is the greater concern. Atlanta possesses one of the two critical factors the league has required for expansion or relocation: A committed ownership group.

The other is a proper place to play. If Blank’s dream stadium doesn’t come true, then men’s professional soccer in Atlanta will be the biggest casualty. The Falcons likely would remain at the Dome, along with the SEC Championship game, Final Fours, ACC and SEC basketball tournaments and other events that occasionally are staged there.

Blank has prided himself on making the Falcons organization a positive and influential corporate and sporting citizen, and to a large degree that has happened. The Falcons are no longer a laughingstock, either on the field or in the community. That they’re upfront about their interest in soccer is a boon that the sport in this city hasn’t enjoyed in decades.

But his announcement this week also underscores the tensions that have existed for some time over the promotion of college and professional sports in Atlanta. Soccer could be caught in the squeeze if those differences aren’t resolved about a new Falcons stadium.

Gary Stokan, who leads the Atlanta World Cup bid group and is a former soccer marketer for Adidas, departed earlier this year as executive director of the Atlanta Sports Council and now presides over the Chick-fil-A Bowl, which was spun off from the ASC. He also is the chief operating officer for the College Football Hall of Fame that will be relocating to Atlanta from South Bend, Ind.

A sinister mind might wonder if Blank’s aversion to a retractable roof isn’t just about the costs. If all, or even some, of those events did leave Atlanta, the sports offerings in Atlanta would be reduced, especially during the fall football season. There would be less competition for the Falcons for the attention (and dollars) of Atlanta sports fans not fanatically tethered to the exploits of UGA, Georgia Tech, or other college teams, etc., etc.

Admittedly, that’s an Oliver Stone scenario. The Braves, who play in summer, have been outspokenly in favor of having pro sports promoted better. They don’t have any serious competitive threats to their season, since both the WNBA’s Atlanta Dream and the revived Atlanta Beat of Women’s Professional Soccer are in very small niches. An MLS team would be in a bigger niche.

In 1997, after the Braves moved to Turner Field, a local soccer group that included Phil Woosnam felt extremely chastened as it fought vainly to preserve Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium as a soccer venue.

The old home of the Braves was absolutely going to be razed, but there were suspicions that the Braves, and Robert Dale Morgan, Stokan’s predecessor at the ASC, were either hostile to a bigger soccer imprint in Atlanta or at least indifferent to it.

An outdoor stadium built for the Falcons would mean not only keeping the possibility of MLS alive, but also having it stage friendlies such as those last year and this coming summer at the Dome, World Cup qualifying and other big-time soccer events.

Atlanta could finally become a major soccer city and shed its notorious fragmentation in that sport. There’s time to make something work with or without the World Cup coming here, but right now the larger Atlanta sports community appears to be very divided.

At the U.S. World Cup training camp in Princeton, N.J., Soccer By Ives correspondent Franco Panizo talks to Ricardo Clark and his battle to get fully healthy after recovering from a calf strain that sidelined him for most of the winter and spring:

“I feel ready, I have the mentality that I’m always going to be ready. I played the last three games of the season, played full 90 minutes and felt fit so I think I’ll be good for this camp.”

The “book” has been handed over in Zurich, by U.S. defender Carlos Bocanegra, and into the hands of the folks at FIFA who in December will choose the host countries for the 2018 and 2022 World Cup tournaments.

Atlanta, of course, is one of the 18 venue cities included in the bid, both for games as as the city for an international broadcast center. The World Cup draw would be held in Miami with the opening match in the montrous House That Jerry Jones Built in the Big D.

The BBC breaks down the bidding field of nations, including the oddsmakers’ lines. They’re not so good for the U.S. in 2018, but there isn’t a line for the Yanks in ‘22. What’s up with that?

Of course, if it is later rather than sooner, maybe Arthur Blank will have a new Falcons stadium.

If the Brits don’t get the World Cup in ‘18, after the Beckham Factor on display in Switzerland, then they’re never going to get it again. Jeez, even The Daily Telegraph gives him some op-ed space for all this

And these “books” look about as thick as Congressional legislation, don’t they? Will Sepp Blatter and the Lords of FIFA be inclined go through these any more than the garden variety Capitol Hill backbencher?

After all, Josep has publicly said he does like the bid by Qatar, for the purely political reason of having the World Cup in the Arab world, and therefore expanding his geographical power base from one end of Asia to another.

You know where to keep up with the Atlanta World Cup efforts at its Web site and Facebook page. Here’s a list of local tournaments, festivals and other events in Atlanta tied to the bid effort.

And here’s the U.S. bid’s promo video that may or not get a look in Zurich with decision day less than seven months away:

What’s been rumored for several weeks was made official today: Soccer is returning to the Georgia Dome this summer.

For the second time in as many summers, the home of the Falcons will play host to an international friendly, this time on July 28, pitting Club América of Mexico against Manchester City of the English Premier League.

It’s formally called the Atlanta International Soccer Challenge, and for a time tickets are a (comparatively) cheap $25 a head. If you wait until late June (with World Cup frenzy heating up) the tickets start at $40.

So welcome, Atlanta, to the expensive international soccer friendly tour.

I only mean that partially tongue-in-cheek, because it’s another audition for Atlanta as a World Cup venue with FIFA due to decide on the 2018 and 2022 events later this year.

On Friday, the U.S. Soccer Federation formally sends its World Cup bid to FIFA on Friday, and that package includes Atlanta not only playing host to games but also to be the site for the World Cup international broadcasting center.

It’s a feature that Gary Stokan, head of the Atlanta bid organizing committee, has been discussing for nearly a year.

Here’s more on the Atlanta bid.

The game features a returnee from last year’s World Football Challenge. Club América, one of the most popular teams in Mexico, will face Manchester City, which has splashed out nearly $300 million in new players since being purchased by an Abu Dhabi conglomerate last year.

Yet City managed to finish only fifth in the Premier League, three points short of earning place in the European Champions League qualifying.

By the time of its American tour, City may well be going through another major makeover. Briefly put, this club is one of the big soap operas of global soccer, and there’s no telling who’s going to make the trip or even take the pitch at the Georgia Dome.

So think about that before you open your wallet.

The idea, of course, is to support spectator soccer in Atlanta, which has had a checkered history of support. Crowds of more than 50,000 turned out for each of the games at the Georgia Dome last year, and a similar draw is likely.

The first big international soccer match in Atlanta also involved Manchester City, which came over to play the Atlanta Chiefs in 1968. That was the last year City won an English top-flight title, while the Chiefs won the inaugural North American Soccer League crown that year.

Over at The Global Game, his most excellent site on soccer and culture, my friend John Turnbull writes about when soccer contagion first hit Atlanta.

Former AFC Lightning and St. Pius X standout Ricardo Clark was selected as expected today for the initial 30-man U.S. World Cup roster by coach Bob Bradley.

Bradley must pare his final roster to 23 before embarking on South Africa. Clark recently made his debut for Eintracht Frankfurt in the German Bundesliga after coming over from the Houston Dynamo of MLS.

But he’s been battling injuries for most of the season, and there’s quite a bit of competition in the defensive midfield. It was Maurice Edu, the talented member of Scottish champion Glasgow Rangers, who was unable to go to the Confederations Cup last summer because of injury, paving the way for Clark to make his biggest international impression to date.

Not making the U.S. roster was forward Charlie Davies, who is recovering from a horrific car crash last summer that nearly killed him. Doctors wouldn’t clear him for action, and the only way he could play in the World Cup now is to get a special roster exemption that FIFA allows but that is rarely employed.

Atlanta has been included among the 18 cities that will constitute the U.S. World Cup bid proposal for either 2018 or 2022.

The USA Bid Committee on Tuesday unveiled the venues and cities that will be submitted to FIFA this spring as part of its formal World Cup proposal. FIFA will select the host nations for both events in December.

Should the U.S. receive a bid for either of those World Cups, Atlanta might become the rare city to host most of the major global and North American sporting events. The city has played host to the Super Bowl, several Final Fours, a number of World Series involving the Braves and the 1996 Summer Olympics.

FIFA likely would approve games in no more than 12 of those cities, and the list does not have to be finalized until five years before a World Cup.

The Georgia Dome played host to two crowds in excess of 50,000 for international soccer matches last summer. But the Atlanta bid also stipulates that if a new stadium is built for the Atlanta Falcons, that facility could be the site for World Cup matches.

“The game is on!” said Gary Stokan, president of the Atlanta Sports Council, which spearheaded the Atlanta bid committee.

He said the committee will continue to work with the USA Bid Committee and prepare for a visit later in the year from FIFA representatives, who will be inspecting all 18 cities in the U.S. proposal.

“We’ve been on pins and needles about this, because it means a lot to our community,” said Georgia Soccer executive director Rick Skirvin. “I felt pretty good about our chances because of how hard so many people worked to support this bid. We were doing things right from the beginning.”

Perhaps the biggest signs of support were a petition signing-drive launched by Georgia Soccer and a compansion fundraising effort that netted $75,000. Keeping Atlanta in the World Cup mix also gives the organization, which represents 70,000 youth players and their families around the state, a chance to build further momentum around its events and tournaments.

“All the events we put on will have an extra touch to it,” Skirvin said, referring specifically to the Atlanta Cup, Georgia Soccer’s biggest event, a youth tournament held on the Labor Day weekend that is one of the biggest in the Southeast.

The Atlanta bid also includes an offer for the city, as a major transportation and media hub, to serve as the site for an International Broadcast Center for the World Cup.

There’s a real Sun Belt feel to this selection of cities, which include Miami, Tampa Bay, Houston, Dallas, Phoenix and — perhaps the biggest inclusion — Nashville, which had a crowd of more than 30,000 for a U.S.World Cup qualifying match last year.

The glaring absences: No Chicago, which recently lost its bid to play host to the 2014 Olympics. Not only is it the home of President Barack Obama, but also for the U.S. Soccer Federation.

The San Francisco Bay Area also was excluded after serving, along with Chicago, as a 1994 venue.

Cities that were 1994 World Cup venues and are on the list of 18 include Boston, Dallas, New York, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Also on board are Philadelphia, Baltimore, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Denver, San Diego and Seattle, which quickly has become one of the biggest soccer hotbeds in North America with the inclusion of the Sounders in Major League Soccer.

While Seattle is the clear fan favorite to play host to World Cup matches — should the event return to America in the next decade or so — a poll on the USA Bid Committee’s Web site reveals that Atlanta is in second place.

Of the top 10 vote-getting cities, only Dallas was a venue for the 1994 World Cup.

Georgia Soccer has raised $75,000 in a show of financial support that is one of many factors taken into consideration by the committee, which is expected this month to pare down its final list of cities to be submitted to FIFA for the 2018 or 2022 World Cup.

Here’s an argument from an Atlantan who says poor fan support for pro teams should rule Atlanta out as a World Cup host.

I think that rationale is all wet, and here’s why: Atlanta soccer fans haven’t been given much to cheer from a litany of badly-run franchises. I know, because I’ve covered most of them since 1995.

Some, like Johnny Imerman and Vincent Lu, ultimately left the old A-League Ruckus by the side of the road.

The various parties involved in the Silverbacks have been more committed, and have enjoyed some occasional success. But last summer, while more than 50,000 people gathered at the Georgia Dome not once, but twice, to watch soccer played there for the first time, the Silverbacks lay dormant.

The ongoing dispute involving the United Soccer Leagues doesn’t appear to be any closer to a resolution, and there’s the possibility that there won’t be pro men’s soccer in Atlanta again next summer.

I know some loyal Silverbacks fans who have spent a lot of money for tickets, T-shirts, souvenirs and road trips over the years and who ultimately have soured on the idea of ever spending another dime on that team if it is resurrected.

The bottom line is that for most of the last decade and a half — since the last World Cup — there hasn’t been a good enough product on the field that’s been worth anyone’s patronage.

You can’t blame the fans for any of that.