I recognize that the audience here at TDT is more likely to agree with the general premise of this entry—that watching soccer can be extremely entertaining, despite the numerous individuals that I’m sure that are out there who couldn’t care less. But I felt that something has to be written in response to the last-minute last-gasp effort that saved the US Women’s National Team in the Women’s World Cup.
One of my buddies from my program, who I will be living with next year, is about as pro American football as an individual that I’ve ever met. He lives for both Saturday and Sunday in the Fall. His first words after the Packers were the Super Bowl were “I’m going to miss football season.” And both of us found ourselves in a conversation with the third guy in the program, who might be more avid about soccer than I am (i.e. watched almost all of the World Cup matches in the previous cycle… and would regularly wake up at three or four in the morning for the World Cup before that). Future roommate made an argument that he really wouldn’t ever be able to substitute the world “football,” of the American sense, with “football,” of the European sense, which is what third guy was doing when we were talking about the Portland Timbers and our excitement to go see a game (because the Timbers’ Army seems like it is ridiculous). Future roommate started rehashing all of the well-worn arguments that I’ve read numerous times on pieces on the internet: Americans don’t/won’t understand the game (or the history of the game), not enough scoring, too boring, too much flopping, etc. I think he brought up these points more to see how third guy was going to react—understandably, it got a bit of a rise out of him. But future roommate also acknowledged that soccer could be entertaining, especially at the national level (though he argued that he probably would never watch MLS).
I think today’s game, at least, should dismantle some of those arguments. Gwendolith (hooray, new author!) and I were furiously texting during today’s match, as the referee constantly made errors with her decision-making that continued to put the US into a hole: the red card, waving off the first PK, the subsequent yellow card for Hope Solo (which apparently was for her mouthing off to the ref—which was definitely not clear during the broadcast of the game), the failure to call an offside’s before Marta’s goal… I resigned myself to the fact that the ref was going to lose the game to us before Abby Wambach’s amazing header:
(Yeah, that happened. Photos courtesy of the USWNT Blog)
It was one of those moments that I’ll never forget, mainly because of the sheer drama and unlikelihood of the moment (playing for almost an hour with 10 players?! Scoring in the 122nd minute?!). Much like when the Giants won the World Series (forever known on this blog as TGWTWS—also, if Isaac gets to talk about the Red Sox, I’m going to talk about the Giants), when I woke up to hear that the US had upset Portugal in the 2002 woke up (on the radio in the bedroom in my old house in El Sobrante), and when the USWNT won the World Cup in 1999 (at Lakeridge, an athletic club, watching on the big screen TV).
And then, Hope did her thing (as Gwendolith said, she’s “got sass”).
(Yeah, that also happened)
And the Americans—in quite an unlikely circumstance—put the Brazilians away.
There were those after the match that said this team demonstrated true “American Spirit” in that they never gave up, kept plugging away, and came through, despite the circumstances. While I’m not sure true “American Spirit” exists—maybe it’s more of a myth in today’s day (though politicians would likely claim otherwise)—the ladies showed tremendous grit, poise, and cajones. It was absolutely wonderful to watch, and the match was highly entertaining.
But it got me thinking—I think part of the appeal of watching or soccer national teams is that they play for the pride of our country. How many other American athletic teams can say that they do that? In all honestly, the World Baseball Classic will never mean all that much because of the contrived circumstances that it is played under (one game matches, played in Spring Training, and a general lack of teams from countries not in Asia or South/Central America). There might have been a time where basketball athletes would have given their heart and souls to play for their team (aka the ’92 Dream Team—but even then, they were steamrolling opponents as the game hadn’t developed as much in other countries), but I would argue that it is no longer the case. Football would clearly be a joke at an international level. Maybe it is only hockey players that match the intensity of soccer players donning their countries uniforms (I loved watching the gold medal match in the Winter Olympics last year)… Regardless, the USWNT is fighting to maintain their stature within the game, while the USMNT plays to prove their worth at an international stage. Is that not patriotic? Is that not inspiring?
What a great game.
P.S. ESPN wins today. There aren't too many days where I can say that I really enjoy ESPN--I really only watch out of bad habits and having something to watch. Today, they showed the game today, ESPN Classic of the '99 World Cup, Timbers v. Sounders, and SF Giants v. NY Mets. Needless to say, I didn't accomplish much.
