Kasey Keller

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Personal information
Kasey Keller
Full name	Kasey C. Keller
Date of birth	November 29, 1969 (age 37)
Place of birth	Olympia, WA, USA
Height	6 ft 2 in (1.88 m)
Nickname	The Truth
Playing position	Goalkeeper
Youth clubs
1988-1990	Colonial Meats North Thurston High School University of Portland
Senior clubs¹
Years	Club	App (Gls)*
1989 1992-1996 1996-1999 1999-2001 2001-2005 2004 2005-	F.C. Portland Millwall Leicester City Rayo Vallecano Tottenham Hotspur →Southampton (loan) Borussia Mönchengladbach	010 (0) 178 (0) 099 (0) 051 (0) 085 (0) 004 (0) 050 (0)
National team²
1990-	United States	096 (0)
¹ Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only and correct as of 05:21, 3 January 2007 (UTC). ² National team caps and goals correct as of 23 June 2006. * Appearances (Goals)

Kasey Keller, nicknamed "The Truth" by many passionate fans, (born November 29, 1969 in Olympia, Washington, United States) is a soccer (football) goalkeeper, four time World Cup participant and one of the first American goalkeepers to become a regular in the English Premier League. He is of partial German descent.^{[citation needed]}

Keller played his college career at the University of Portland. As a freshman in 1988, he backstopped the team to the NCAA men's soccer final four. He earned first team All American as a senior and was the 1991 Adidas Goalkeeper of the Year. During the 1989 college off-season, he played for F.C. Portland of the Western Soccer Alliance. His outstanding play led to his selection as league MVP that year. In 10 games, he allowed only 4 goals for a 0.38 GAA and 8 shutouts.

In 1989, he split his time between F.C. Portland and the U.S. U-20 national team which finished fourth at the 1989 FIFA U-20 World Cup. Keller once again excelled and was awarded the tournament's Silver Ball as the tournament's second best player.

He got his first senior team cap against Colombia on February 4, 1990. After being a member of the US National Team in the 1990 FIFA World Cup, he was signed by the English club Millwall, playing there and becoming a fan favorite between 1992 and 1996. Keller made his Millwall debut on 2 May 1992 and played his last game on 5 May 1996, making 202 overall appearances for The Lions. When Millwall was relegated to the Second Division, the team transferred Keller to Leicester City for $1.4 million on August 15, 1996. Leicester City had just won promotion to the Premiership. In his first year with the club, Keller backstopped the team to the League Cup in 1997. After being ignored by US coach Bora Milutinovic for the 1994 FIFA World Cup, he made Steve Sampson's ill-fated squad in 1998, and played two games at the World Cup. Keller was an overage selection for the 1996 Olympics team, starting all three matches.

Kasey was named U.S. Soccer Athlete of the Year in 1997 and 1999. In 2000, Keller signed with the Spanish club Rayo Vallecano and played there for two years. He came back to England and the Premier League in 2001, signing with Tottenham Hotspur. Relegated to backup duty for Neil Sullivan early on, he won the starting spot, and played every minute for Spurs in both the 2002-03 and the 2003-04 seasons. Keller was second choice to Brad Friedel in the 2002 FIFA World Cup. He has earned 96 caps for the US and is the team's all-time leader in wins and keeping cleansheets (shutouts).

Perhaps his most famous clean sheet came in the historic 1998 win vs Brazil. Keller played all 90 minutes in goal and made many key saves in preserving the 1-0 shutout victory for the US. His performance in goal prompted Brazilian great Romario to remark “That is the best performance by a goalkeeper I have ever seen in a match.” [1]

In the 2004-05 Premiership season, Keller fell out of favor at Tottenham as Paul Robinson became the first choice keeper. In November 2004, Kasey was loaned out to Southampton, a Premiership club ravaged by injuries to its goalkeeping corps, for one month.

On January 15, 2005, Keller joined German Bundesliga side Borussia Mönchengladbach on a free transfer during the Bundesliga's winter break. He got off to a good start in the Bundesliga, keeping a clean sheet in his first appearance for Borussia. Keller played every minute in the second half of the season and kept a total of seven clean sheets in that period, playing an important role in saving the club from relegation.

Keller crowned the US's run in the 2005 CONCACAF Gold Cup tournament with a clean sheet in the final match against Panama and two saves in the penalty shootout to give the side the trophy. Keller started the first seven games of the final round of World Cup qualifying in 2005, recording five consecutive clean sheets and 507 consecutive goalless minutes to lead the U.S. to qualification for the 2006 FIFA World Cup Finals in Germany. He then became the first male player in US history to win his third Athlete of the Year award. On May 2, 2006, Keller and teammate Claudio Reyna became the first two Americans named to four World Cup Rosters. In that World Cup, he played in all three games, being named Man of the Match in the 1-1 draw with Italy in Kaiserslautern on June 17, 2006.

Keller also lives in Haus Donk, a castle in Tönisvorst, near Mönchengladbach.[2][3] During the 2006-2007 season he will be one of two Bundesliga players that are hobby-columnist for RUND, a German football magazine published once each month, reflecting his life in Germany and his Bundesliga career within those lines. He shares that role with VfB Stuttgart's shot-stopper Timo Hildebrand. On August 10, 2006, Keller was selected by his teammates to captain club side Borussia Mönchengladbach during the 2006-07 campaign. He is the second American (after Claudio Reyna) to captain a top level German club and expressed his desire to stay on with Borussia Mönchengladbach for more than just the rest of the season in the wake of that.

[edit] Trivia

During in the 2006 FIFA World Cup he became the only surviving squad member of anybody in the world to participate in both the 2006 and 1990 World Cups.

[edit] External links

Preceded by Eric Wynalda	U.S. Soccer Athlete of the Year 1997	Succeeded by Cobi Jones
Preceded by Cobi Jones	U.S. Soccer Athlete of the Year 1999	Succeeded by Chris Armas
Preceded by Landon Donovan	U.S. Soccer Athlete of the Year 2005	Succeeded by Oguchi Onyewu

	United States squad - 1990 FIFA World Cup
1 Meola \| 2 Trittschuh \| 3 Doyle \| 4 Banks \| 5 Windischmann \| 6 Harkes \| 7 Ramos \| 8 Bliss \| 9 Sullivan \| 10 Vermes \| 11 Wynalda \| 12 Krumpe \| 13 Eichmann \| 14 Stollmeyer \| 15 Armstrong \| 16 Murray \| 17 Balboa \| 18 Keller \| 19 Henderson \| 20 Caligiuri \| 21 Covone \| 22 Vanole \| Coach: Gansler

	United States squad - 1998 FIFA World Cup
1 Friedel \| 2 Hejduk \| 3 Pope \| 4 Burns \| 5 Dooley \| 6 Regis \| 7 Wegerle \| 8 Stewart \| 9 Moore \| 10 Ramos \| 11 Wynalda \| 12 Agoos \| 13 Jones \| 14 Preki \| 15 Deering \| 16 Sommer \| 17 Balboa \| 18 Keller \| 19 Maisonneuve \| 20 McBride \| 21 Reyna \| 22 Lalas \| Coach: Sampson

	United States squad - 2002 FIFA World Cup Quarter-finalists
1 Friedel \| 2 Hejduk \| 3 Berhalter \| 4 Mastroeni \| 5 O'Brien \| 6 Regis \| 7 Lewis \| 8 Stewart \| 9 Moore \| 10 Reyna \| 11 Mathis \| 12 Agoos \| 13 Jones \| 14 Cherundolo \| 15 Wolff \| 16 Llamosa \| 17 Beasley \| 18 Keller \| 19 Meola \| 20 McBride \| 21 Donovan \| 22 Sanneh \| 23 Pope \| Coach: Arena

	United States squad - 2006 FIFA World Cup
1 Howard \| 2 Albright \| 3 Bocanegra \| 4 Mastroeni \| 5 O'Brien \| 6 Cherundolo \| 7 Lewis \| 8 Dempsey \| 9 Johnson \| 10 Reyna \| 11 Ching \| 12 Berhalter \| 13 Conrad \| 14 Olsen \| 15 Convey \| 16 Wolff \| 17 Beasley \| 18 Keller \| 19 Hahnemann \| 20 McBride \| 21 Donovan \| 22 Onyewu \| 23 Pope \| Coach: Arena

Borussia Mönchengladbach - Current Squad

Persondata
NAME	Keller, Kasey
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Professional soccer player
DATE OF BIRTH	November 29, 1969
PLACE OF BIRTH	Olympia, Washington
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH