9781422278307

The United States is not a traditional soccer nation. There are plenty of reasons why this is true, and an entire book could easily be dedicated to the topic. For the purposes of this book, the reasons are touched on broadly. First and foremost, American athletes are distracted by, and attracted to, several other American-invented sports. LeBron James, Tom Brady, and Mike Trout do not play soccer. The sporting heroes of America’s young athletes make dunks, not free kicks. They hit home runs, not headers. American kids often grow up playing soccer, but after watching their star athletes play more traditionally American sports, they focus on basketball, football, and baseball instead. Kids just do not grow up in an environment where they are immersed in the sport like they do in Europe or South America, where soccer is king. Perhaps as a product of the dominance of traditional American sports, coaching in American soccer has understandably not been very good. At the youth level, many coaches are dads with great intentions but little knowledge of the game. To be fair, the sport’s governing body, US Soccer, has made great efforts to improve the state of coaching in the game in recent years, but it will be a long time before the quality is top level and universal around the country, and even the youngest kids have coaches with experience and training. One of the major hurdles has been figuring out how to pay for the needed overhaul in coaching and development, and how to make sure America sees the benefits of the investment. Pouring millions into kids who turn out to be excellent players only to see those players go overseas to play in Europe is a difficult proposition to sell. US Soccer is invested in continuing to improve the game at the Major League Soccer (MLS) level as well, however, so that the young players developed in America have a league to play in that is worthy of their skills. Despite these challenges, American soccer does have a history with proud moments and players who have worn the red, white, and blue uniforms of the United States Men’s National Team (USMNT) with pride. At the World Cup, Team USA has been there from the beginning, and hopes to return to the sport’s biggest stage soon.

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