Political Football

The U.S. men's soccer ream faces Iran in tomorrow's Group B game.  If the Americans lose or play Iran to a draw, they're eliminated and go home with their fellow companion in misery, the Canadian team (which got blown out of the water by Croatia).

Iranian state media, however, have called for the U.S. to be eliminated immediately.

US Soccer removed the symbol of the Islamic Republic from the Iranian national flag in the graphic showing the Group B standings of both teams along with England and Wales (who also play teach other tomorrow - Brit against Brit, only in the World Cup, folks!).  US Soccer did so temporarily for 24 hours to show solidarity with Iranian women and anti-government Iranian men protesting against the hijab rule and to express anger over the brutal crackdown against said protestors.  Iran calls it an insult to the flag and has called for the expulsion of the Americans as punishment.

Because the Iranians show such great respect for the flags of other nations.

The U.S. men's team scored a lot of points for their defiance against Iran and supporting Iranian women.  Even sports journalist Christine Brennan, who never says anything about the men's team (probably because they lose a lot) voiced her approval for their actions.  But, alas, the American men are likely to score more points off the field than on it.  Iran is favored to win, and even if Iranian players don't concur with the anti-American hostility of their government (and by all accounts, they don't), their inevitable victory will expel the Americans for their leaders.  It will be like 1998 all over again, when the Iranians eliminated the U.S. Team from the World Cup in France, with the Americans coming in dead last, and the Iranian leadership poured salt in our wounds. 

Oh yeah, after that, the U.S. women's team came to the rescue of American honor a year later and won the Women's World Cup decisively. They've won it thrice since then, making the U.S. women's team the most successful women's soccer team in the world even as, among men's teams, the U.S. is among the least. 

This pattern is;likely to continue indefinitely.  The women will keep winning until, like Donald Trump likes to say, they'll be sick and tired of winning.  (Not that Trump would care about women's soccer, because it involved two things he completely disrespects - women and soccer.) The men? Aah, they're as likely to win the World Cup as Bernie Sanders is likely to become President.  The men's team, famous for sucking, cannot simply reverse decades of sucking and suddenly rise to a level of consistent competence.

But it could be worse. 

Our boys could be as bad as the Canadian men's team, which just got eliminated from only its second World Cup ever.