WORLD CUP JUNE 26, 2010
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What made this team different? Longtime fans of the national team will remember our past painful efforts to string together possession. Or the times when our defense consisted of spasmodic clearances. Or the moment we coupled poor quality with poor character, staging our own disgraceful mutiny. This was a fine team in every respect. It should be said that they played several atrocious halves, the kind that reminded one of the most shambolic chapters of our soccer history. But they were able to put those behind them. They were a team that had mythic aspirations and seemed prone to shatter the ceiling that held the U.S. in the second rank of soccer nations. And so now we return to that strangely familiar feeling of finding proxy identities for ourselves, that great empathic act of championing nationalist armies of foreign countries. Of course, what makes the loss so painful is the sense that the U.S. felt like it was on the brink of the cultural transformation that every fan wants—even when professing to care less. The great tipping point was imminent. Was it a coincidence that there were so many “Yes We Can” signs in the stadiums? This felt like the sport's Barack Obama moment. What makes the World Cup such wonderful spectacle, and makes exits from it so pungent, is the simple fact of the four year interval between occurrences. There's no next year.
4 comments
Gracious in defeat and also very true, Frank. You should have won it in the 90 and you gave two soft goals but that's background really; a more than entertaining contribution to the tournament. Hopefully, the team will get a good homecoming reception. They've earned it.
- IggyPop
June 26, 2010 at 6:32pm
I regret USA's loss. They played lovely football, very simple, very direct and very unagressive. Now, just between us, if you want to win, that lovely way won't do.
- Ideaot
June 27, 2010 at 2:47am
There's a particular myopia in a lot of this mournful commentary that bothers me: aren't we forgetting that, since 1991, there are now /two/ World Cups, and that our own U.S. Women's team was crowned the champions as recently as 1999? Surely at least the exuberant jersey-shedding celebration of Brandi Chastain hasn't vanished down the memory hole?
- austinexpat
June 27, 2010 at 10:04am
Although four years feels like a long way away, and anybody who loves US Soccer should feel sick to their stomach for a few days/weeks, there's much to be thankful for. First, the younger we get, the better we are. Altidore, Bradley, and Edu, were our strongest performers, and are among a cohort of players below the age of 25. Second, we walk away from this tournament with very identifiable, teachable moments to reinforce our national development. Better defensive organization from start to finish needs to be a priority, combined with an emphasis on identifying and developing goal scoring strikers at the youth level (Altidore still young and impressionable enough to merit that kind of developmental attention). In years, and tournaments, past you could throw a stone in the wrong direction and hit a reason why our team was doomed to fail. Those days are long gone. Now we are a classy team with real quality, who can contend with the best in the world. There is real hope for the future (especially if we can insure that Ricardo Clarke never gets another cap). Third, and to Mr. Foer's point about our cultural transformation on the brink, George Vescey's NYT article this morning similarly characterizes the disappointment of yesterday's loss, though he keeps in mind the comforting reality that "the country is starting to accumulate a soccer history." As Mr. Foer has done well to articulate, soccer is a sport that resists statistical categorization in almost every way, and as such is a sport that requires a robust collective consciousness from its players and its fans. I, like many, watched yesterday's match in a bar filled to overflow on the street with supporters standing on tip toes to get a glimpse of the screen through the windows. I think it's fair to say that four years ago the same bar and game wouldn't have had near the attendance, or attention. So on a brighter note, I would simply suggest that our cultural development is not on the brink, but is, and has been, well under way. Though we have ways to go our players and our fans are learning what it means to be a true soccer nation. Not to ignore the depressing reality of our departure, but there's plenty to look forward to, and maybe in tournaments to come we won't need the smoothest route to the semi-final to believe in our teams potential success. We'll surely see.
- rkehoe
June 27, 2010 at 12:12pm