Women's Soccer News: LA Vikings Announce Their International Roster for the Upcoming 2012 LA Viking Cup

The LA Viking Club has announced its roster for the team that will participate in the inaugural 2012 LA Viking Cup to be played in Fullerton, Calif., between November 23 and December 1. Comprised of seasoned soccer stars that have competed in the most prestigious women' soccer competition around the world, the LA Vikings will take on the Philippine Women's National Soccer Team, the California Cosmos and the Trinidad and Tobago Women's National Team.

The star-studded group includes National Team players like goalkeepers Alejandra Velazco from Colombia and Italy's Anna Maria Picarelli and world-class strikers such as Mexico's Maribel Dominguez and England's Lianne Sanderson. Dominguez will be joined by defender Marlene Sandoval, another member of the Mexican Women's National Team.

The United States will be represented by some of the most outstanding college players ever and several players from the U.S. Women’s National Team pool at all levels, including McCall Zerboni, Lori Lindsey and Sinead L. Farrelly. Several of the American players participated this past summer in the inaugural season of the Women’s Premier Soccer League (WPSL) Elite League.

The concept of an international professional team started in 2011 when the LA Viking Club, under their charter to develop, foster and promote, women's soccer at its highest level, planned the creation of an international invitational cup.

“I went to the WPS Championship and started asking (players), ‘what are you doing in the off-season, and can we put a team together?’ The players jumped at it,” said LA Vikings President and Coach Robert P. Kleinberger. “The problem became, who we play. We can’t play colleges because they were in season, (and) it doesn’t make sense to play U19 (club) teams. I searched around and found some national teams (Sweden, Canada, Mexico), and one thing led to another. The question was, are we competitive enough.”

“LA Viking has a relationship with U.S. Club Soccer, and WPSL has an affiliation with USSF,” Kleinberger explained. “We were able to register the LA Vikings through WPSL with USSF. To form the team, the players had to sign USSF paperwork. Free agents, who were not registered players already under contract, became courtesy loan players.”

The Vikings played the U.S. Women’s National Team on December 10, 2011, to a 1-1 tie, just one day after the players got together for the first time. They lost to Canada on their second outing, but by then, the plan to create the tournament was on its way. Earlier this year the LA Vikings hosted the Canadian Women's National Team in their preparation for the 2012 London Olympic Games, and the games, held at Cal State Fullerton’s Titan Stadium, served to provide the experience towards presenting the inaugural LA Viking Cup.

This year, in the officially sanctioned tournament, teams will face off in a single round competition with Championship and Third Place games. In addition to the tournament matches, all participating teams will have the opportunity to play Friendly games starting on November 17, 2012.

Official Roster for the LA Vikings:

Player	Pos.	Hometown	Age	College
Sarah Huffman	M	Flower Mound, Texas	28	University of Virginia
Alejandra Velasco	GK	Houston, TX	26	Universidad Javeriana Cali
McCall Zerboni	M	Hamburg, NY	25	UCLA
Lori Lindsey	M	Indianapolis, IN	32	University of Virginia
Courtney Wetzel	M/D	Puylallup, WA	22	Oregon State University (OSU)
Allie Long	M	Northport, NY	25	University of North Carolina
Marlene Sandoval	D	Placentia, CA	28	CS Fullerton
Joanna Lohman	M/D	Silver Spring, MD	30	Pennylvania State University
Lianne Sanderson	F	Lewisham, England	24
Nikki Washington	F/M	Mesquite, TX	24	University of North Carolina
Anna M. Picarelli	GK	Marina Del Rey, CA	27	Pepperdine University, CA
Bianca D'Agostino	M	Longmeadow, MA	23	Wake Forest, NC
Sinead L.Farrelly	M	Havertown, PA	23	University of Virginia
Elizabeth Bogus	F	Salt Lake City, UT	28	Arizona State University
Jazmyne Avant	D	Copell, TX	21	University of Florida
Whitney Engen	D	R. Hills Estates, CA	24	University of North Carolina
Maribel Dominguez	F	Mexico City, Mexico	33
Kandace Wilson	F	Walnut, CA	27	Cal State Fullerton
Leslie Osborne	M	Brookfield, WI	29	Santa Clara University

Tickets are now available via the tournament’s official site: http://www.lavikingcup.us.

Related Article: Maribel Dominguez to Play in Viking Cup