Trump’s Red Card

What happened at the World Cup is more or less when I expected when I decided not to follow it.  I didn’t imagine Donald Trump interfering in a disputed and disputable referee call against the United States team’s best kicker, but I could certainly see something coming a mile away. Because where Trump is involved, disaster is inevitable.

You know the story by now, but for those who don’t . . .  Folarin Balogun (above) received a red card after colliding with a Bosnian player in the game the U.S. won against Bosnia and Herzegovina 2-0.  The red card prevented him from playing in the United States' game against Belgium, but the situation for which he was carded aroused controversy for being a bad call.  But just as Megyn Kelly drew attention away from a black commentator’s suggestion that Santa Claus, who is always depicted as white, be replaced with a Christmas penguin by insisting that Santa Claus is white and that black people should just get used to it, Trump rendered the original controversy irrelevant by creating a new and bigger one. He personally intervened to get Balogun’s suspension removed in time for the game against Belgium. 

Now, I’m not saying that Trump is a curse, but when he sticks his nose into other people's business, he has a tendency to discombobulate people trying to take care of said business.  All he did was discombobulate and psych out the United States men's soccer team, who had a lot riding on their next game.  The team has been so good that they actually became something that the women’s team has long been and the men’s team has never been  - a favorite.  This team actually had a chance to win the World Cup. But they went in with Balogun playing when he likely shouldn't have, the guilt weighing heavy on their minds, and they lost to Belgium, 4-1. 

I’d like to say that the Belgians, being old world, and all that, we’re good winners, but they in fact, taunted the U.S. men’s national team - who are used to being taunted - by dancing the way Trump dances. That is, they move their fists back-and-forth and stood in place. That wasn't cool, because Balogun's reinstatement wasn’t our team‘s fault, and there was nothing they could have to stop Trump from intervening on their behalf. 

Trump will probably invite them to the White House, though, if only to say to them, "I was only trying to help."

Fortunately, Balogun is much classier than the Belgians. He went to Belgium’s coach after the game and apologized for what had happened and for having played, despite the fact that he should not have. The coach for the Belgian team said that he appreciated and liked Balogun's gesture and said he was very classy. As you can probably tell, Balogun is the son of an immigrant.  His mother is from Britain and happened to be in the United States when he was born. Birthright citizenship!  Of course, he’s a first-generation American, because if his family had been here for several generations before that, he probably wouldn’t be so polite! He can thank his British mother for his manners. 

Manners, of course, are something Trump is completely unfamiliar with. He just made the United States even more hated than it already is by reminding people just how rude we can be we at least as rules the French, but they at least have culture. And the only time Americans experience French culture is when they indulge in a bit of Yoplait yogurt.

And so, the Cinderella team that was the United States men’s soccer team saw its coach turned into a pumpkin, thanks to Trump, their evil fairy godfather.  And so, things go back to the way they were, with the United States men’s soccer team a joke while the United States women’s soccer team will likely be champions in next year‘s women’s World Cup. I would like to say that there’s always 2030, and the good run our men’s soccer team had is a portent of things to come, but in fact, many people believe that this should have been their year and Trump killed it.  Besides, I, being a secessionist, believe that the United States men’s soccer team will not win the 2030 World Cup because I believe that there won't be a Besides, I, being a secessionist, believe that the United States men’s soccer team will not win the 2030 World Cup because I believe that there won’t be an American men’s soccer team.

Because I don't think there’s going to happen an America in 2030.  

I’m in England right now, and apart from two posts I wrote and scheduled before I left the States, I hadn't expected to write a post and publish it while I was away. I should have known better. With Trump, it was bound to happen.

Our Cup Runneth Dry

The United States men's national soccer team played the Netherlands this past Saturday in the round of sixteen at the World Cup and, as expected, lost. 3-1.  As Billy Joel would have said, they had the Midas touch . . . until they met the Dutch.

This raises a lot of questions.  How come we keep getting our hopes up with these lovable losers?  Why does the women's team always have to save our honor by winning their World Cup the year after?  Why did the Yanks blow so many scoring opportunities?  Who honestly thought they could beat the Dutch anyway?  And if the Dutch national color is orange, why do they have a red, white and blue flag that's virtually indistinguishable from Luxembourg's?

I keep hearing stories about how the U.S. Men's National Team has yet to peak, and that they could be real contenders in 2026, when the World Cup is held in North America (the United States, Canada and Mexico) and play mainly on their home turf.   All they need is a better striker, a stronger midfield lineup, and yada yada yada . . .

That's as may be.  American sports fans woke up Saturday morning excited about soccer and went to bed Sunday night after watching twelve hours of NFL games. 

GOAL!

The United States Women's Soccer Team won its suit against US Soccer for being paid less then the men's team.  Now they're getting a sweet $22 million in damages plus $2 million to help them in their post-soccer careers and also to promote women's and girls' soccer.

Justice is done.  

It makes sense for the ruling to be in their favor, because, as one CNN commentator noted yesterday, the women's team has won numerous World Cups and Olympic gold medals whereas the men's team, just as assuredly, have won none.

I wish people in the media wouldn't rub it in against the men's team.

That's my job! 

Though, the men's team, in an attempt to look relevant, have supported the women's team in their suit.

Wait! Guys!  Did I say, "Send in the clowns?" Huh? 😠 😛

All That Glitters Isn't Gold

While the women's World Cup soccer tournament was going on in France, the 2019 CONCACAF Gold Cup was going on back in this hemisphere for the national men's soccer teams of the Americas.  And you probably didn't even know about it.  You may not have even known that the championship game for the Gold Cup took place in Chicago yesterday while the women's championship game was in Lyon, France.

And with good reason.     

The U.S. men's team, the defending Gold Cup champions from 2017, lost the final to Mexico, a national team they haven't defeated in six years. 

I wrote yesterday that the American men's team's failures often coincide with the women's team's successes.  But this may be the first time they coincided on the very same day.

And the men lost on home turf.

What are we paying them again?

The women are getting a ticker-tape parade in Manhattan's "Canyon of Heroes."  I propose that the men's team get a parade in an appropriate urban downtown district.  How about Newark or Detroit?

We'll even have ticker tape thrown at them.

In bundles.

Some of you will say it's easy for me to bash the national men's team when I don't play soccer myself.  No, I don't.  And neither, apparently, does our men's team.    

Red Card

Are you kidding me?

Are you telling me that the United States men's soccer team, long the joke of international soccer, was finally getting somewhere after having won the 2017 Gold Cup and having beaten Panama 4-0 in a qualifying World Cup game, with this new team member Christian Pulisic being on the verge of becoming the first American male soccer player worthy of being compared to Pele, only to lose 2-1 to Trinidad and Tobago - Trinidad and Tobago, a country so insignificant that its only contribution to civilization was Billy Ocean - and thus they missed qualifying for the World Cup for the first time since 1986?  Which was the last time anyone ever heard anything from Billy Ocean?

Okay, I'm going to come out and say it.  In spite of Kanye West, in spite of his Kardashian in-laws, and in spite of Donald Trump himself, the U.S. men's national soccer team is easily the biggest  and most humiliating embarrassment to These States by a wide margin.  They are the most pathetic bunch of incompetents and never-rans I've ever seen.  They don't learn from mistakes, they don't capitalize on their improvements, and they always screw up when they can least afford to.  Their failure to qualify for the 2018 World Cup is the worst thing to happen to men's soccer in America since the Iranians defeated the U.S. at the 1998 World Cup in France and set them on a course to finish last.  As humiliating as it was for American soccer players to be defeated by a country that loves to hate us, at least that time our team, pathetic though it was, made it to the World Cup.  This is even worse than their failure to qualify for the 2016 Olympics, the importance of which pales in comparison to this.  Our men's national soccer team no longer sucks. Now it chokes.

This defeat will deal a huge blow to a sport that's already having trouble gaining traction in this country against the competition from basketball, baseball and most especially American football, which is more of a sadistic tribal ritual than a sport.  Soccer is already in trouble here, as opposed to fútbol americano, which thrives whether the players take a knee for the flag or not.  Major League Soccer (MLS) just can't compete with the NFL for interest and excitement.  You could fill two stadiums with Americans who can tell you who won the last Super Bowl, but you could probably fit in a broom closet all of the Americans who can tell you who won the last MLS Cup without checking Wikipedia on their smartphones.  American sportswriter and noted soccer-basher Frank Deford, who died in May 2017, must be looking down and laughing.

The American absence from the World Cup in 2018 will translate into even lesser interest in Major League Soccer, which means fewer people attending matches or even watching matches on television, and they're already difficult to find on TV in the first place.  That means it will be more difficult to cultivate new players and even more difficult for MLS to attract new homegrown talent; even Christian Pulisic plays professionally in Europe (Germany, to be precise).  Without the U.S. national team in the 2018 World Cup, TV ratings in the U.S. will be a disaster - assuming, of course, that any American television network will want to air it.  Look, when the U.S. boycotted the 1980 Olympics - which, coincidentally, like the 2018 World Cup will be, were held in Russia - to protest the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, do you think NBC, which paid $87 million to broadcast that Olympiad, was going to air the Games without our athletes in them?  Of course it didn't!  As great as Sebastian Coe and Daley Thompson, the two track stars from the United Kingdom at those Games, were, do you think Americans were going to tune into the 1980 Moscow Olympics to root for the British?? 

The 1980 Olympic boycott occurred during one of NBC's worst ratings slumps, incidentally, when all the network had going for it were lame sitcoms like "Hello Larry."  At least "Hello Larry" star McLean Stevenson, unlike the U.S. men's soccer players, never embarrassed himself before an international audience.

Let's face it.  Despite some occasional moments of greatness - imagine a team so cursed it was considered a moment of greatness when it reached eighth place in the World Cup as it did in 2002 - our national men's team sooner or later regresses into mediocrity and has to strive to get back to something resembling a respectable position.  Sadly, our guys just keep falling flat on their faces; like a lovesick teenager who crashes the family car on his way home from a date in which he experienced his first kiss, our team suffers defeats that monumentally dwarf its triumphs.  We couldn't compete in men's soccer if our reputation depended on it, and because soccer is the world's most popular sport, it does.  Coach Bruce Arena's reputation certainly depended on a World Cup 2018 berth; he has since resigned.

We Americans are likely to shrug all this off and pretend it doesn't matter, because that's what we do when we suck at something, and we suck at a lot of things.  We happily ignore the fact that there are things we don't do particularly well at - literacy, health care delivery, infrastructure - and boast about being number one.  Number one in what?  Rich people?  Obese people?  Gun deaths?  Low voter turnout?  We don't stop to think about it. We're too busy congratulating ourselves for our greatness. 

The U.S. will still be a soccer powerhouse, though.  The women's team will likely be favorites in the 2019 Women's World Cup, because that's where the real stars of American soccer are; more people can name Mia Hamm or Brandi Chastain than Alexi Lalas or Landon Donovan.  So let's concede that, in These States, soccer is a "dame game."  Let's forget about the guys.  Really.  There's a better chance that the Washington Redskins will change their name than there is that the this country will ever win the World Cup.  However, we still have a better chance to educate our children well, improve health care,  create a passenger rail network with trains that don't look like they belong in a railway museum - in short, we have a better chance to make America a better place to live.  If we don't, we'll remain a laughingstock of the world, irrelevant and unworthy of respect.

Just like our men's soccer team.