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USMNT

Read of the Day: The End of the Affair

Of all the intimacies of life, the intimacy of fanhood is perhaps the falsest, exposed for USMNT fans during this past World Cup by a single scene of authentic tenderness: Bob Bradley embracing Ricardo Clark after taking him out of the game that might define his career. “I allowed this game to be pressed to my face for a month, and this hug is finally something true and personal, the sweetest and realest glimpse into the lives of two people on my team. All those magazine interviews and Twitter feeds, the piles of second- and third-hand information, become suddenly foolish.” (Casey Wiley/This is American Soccer)

(Image credit: g55/Flickr through a Creative Commons license.)

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Give Us Klinsmann…But Not Yet

Jürgen Klinsmann will be a great USMNT coach — but U.S. soccer won’t be ready to take full advantage of him until after the next World Cup cycle. There aren’t yet enough technically adept players (or players in the MLS to Euro-second-tier-league pipeline) to take advantage of Klinsmann’s abilities to mold a “technically cunning squad” — four more years would improve both those situations, and put him in a better position to gut and remold the USSF. With an eye toward forming a title contender by 2022, hire Klinsmann…but not until 2014. (Jason Kuenle/Match Fit USA)

What if Bob Bradley Had Never Been Born?

Resolved: That Bob Bradley shaved at least two years off the timeline for the United States to become legitimate World Cup title contenders. Consider the case of Ricardo Clark…and how advanced his career would be had Bradley been applying his philosophy of youth cultivation and instigating player movement for eight years instead of four. Bradley’s legacy seems humdrum, but he actually “moved the US from being a regional power…to the cusp of an international power helping scatter players throughout the world.” (Jason Kuenle/Match Fit USA)

‘An American Story, Not a Soccer One’

The debate about whether the World Cup turned Americans on to soccer completely misses how U.S. culture transmogrifies everything into something it can easily digest — “Team USA…was appropriated and fed back to us not as soccer, but as Americans kicking ass.” It was a simplification, a mistranslation, the difference between “an adolescent crush…and the rhythms of foreplay…Maybe we didn’t learn a damn thing about soccer. We did learn, though, that under the right circumstances, we could pretend that didn’t matter in the least.” (Bethlehem Shoals/The Atlantic)

The Bradley Foundation

The hash tag #FireBobBradley shot up Twitter’s top 10 list 20 minutes before the game with Ghana ended on Saturday — even though his stated Objective Knockout Phase was accomplished. Aquarium Drinker says Bradley’s four-year plan for 2010 was masterly, but there’s no one coaching on American soil right now who can take the team further. SoccerAmerica’s Paul Gardner tells Sunil Gulati to keep Bradley, but realize the team is stuck in the rut of “the properties and the mentality of suburban youth soccer and college soccer” and needs to diversify. And Franklin Foer at The Goal Post simply mourns how the USMNT missed capitalizing on the sport’s “Barack Obama moment.”

Toughness: Toward a US Soccer Style

The United States doesn’t have a soccer style, according to Henry Kissinger — by which he meant a high stylization a la Brazil or Spain. What he’s missing is the country’s distinctive attitude toward the game: An athletic, reckless physicality, defensive and mettle-testing, not artful or “interesting,” born of scrimmages and one-on-ones. “It is the [American] middle class’s way of making their boys into men. And at the most basic level, the US style of soccer from the national team on down has taken shape as a response to this yearning.” (John Harpham/Soccer Politics)

USMNT: It Tastes Like Fondue

The knock on U.S. soccer is by now beyond cliché: too white, too upper-middle-class, too burnished by minivan regimentation and helicopter parenting to draw on more than a fraction of the country’s potential talent. Look at the USMNT, though, and you see a group that includes all social classes. But does that mean progress — or is it just an index of soccer’s marginalization in U.S. culture and a “random pattern of access” fed by colleges and children of immigrants? In the end, “we still don’t have enough players like Clint Dempsey. Whatever that means.” (Andrew Guest/Pitch Invasion)

Reads of the Day: Lou Dobbs’ Nightmare

More than 50% of all Mexican-Americans — who total 29 million people — root for Mexico’s MNT, not that of the United States…and the corporate sponsorships follow this passion accordingly, says Kevin Baxter of the Los Angeles Times. It’s even gotten to the point that El Tri will probably steal an American of Mexican descent right out from under the USSF — “it may just be a matter of which team asks first,” Sunil Gulati told The Wall Street Journal‘s Matthew Futterman.

For the Love of Some Good Women

Reasons to prefer watching the U.S. Women’s National Team over the men’s? “Success aside, it’s the style of play. Simply put, the girls share and keep the ball better…Pretty? Patient? Possessive? Controlling? All of the above – but you can’t keep your eyes off them. For all the right reasons.” (Elliott/Futfanatico)

The Curiously Celebrated Bob Bradley

Bob Bradley, U.S. National Coach of the Year? The U.S. Olympic Committee thinks so…but it’s hard to see why: Despite the thrills against Spain and Brazil in South Africa, the USMNT had a pretty mediocre year. And the award just sets Americans up for another World Cup disappointment. (Mark Zeigler/San Diego Union-Tribune; HT du Nord)

Is Title IX Killing U.S. Men’s Soccer?

Why are U.S. women’s national teams favorites in world competitions, while the men are still struggling? Dwight Collins of Ocala.com blames Title IX for drying up men’s college scholarships and forcing those players to other sports. Kristine Newhall at Title IX Blog blames too many football scholarships; Eric McErlain at Saving Sports pulls some numbers; Fake Sigi turns a searing kleig light on the whole conceit.

USMNT 1-0 Life

USMNT 1-0 Life: Tweetie blackouts, your family a blur, the heel of your hand fixed across your mouth, butterflies…such is the agonized life of a U.S. men’s national team fan during World Cup season. And that’s just for friendlies… (Dave Connell/Aquarium Drinker)