OT: Association Football Thread II (All Soccer Talk Here!)

[East Coast Bias]

Klinnsman out as coach and technical director.

Finally.

 

[Raspewtin]

Good riddance.

 

[nyrmetros]

Let's see what Bruce Arena can do with the National team after all these years away.....

 

[Machinehead]

 

[Machinehead]

 

[Machinehead]

I wanna see Jurgen Klopp beat up AV

 

[Don Chytil]

Anybody here thinking about becoming an NYC FC season ticket holder? I'm looking to split my tickets with someone else if any other fans are interested - I've currently got a pair of two, so I'd be open to selling a package of 2 tickets for multiple games and/or selling 1 ticket to games where we would both be interested in going. Open to selling 1 ticket for potential playoff games as well.

I got in at the founding member price so the tickets are very reasonable for the location (Section 228, lower row, $32/seat), you'd pay the same STH price for any games you're interested in. Feel free to PM me for details.

 

[bl02]

World Cup qualifying

Expected a Close win or at worst a tie but didn't expect a rout of Honduras tonight. Christian pulisic is gonna be a star if not already a star! Huge win if they can hold on to this lead of course

 

[Jabroni]

Unbelievable! Hat trick for Dempsey, Pulisic is putting on a clinic.

 

[sabremike]

All hail Bruce Arena!

 

[bl02]

Haha yes Bruce is back.

 

[Dr. Ogrodnick]

Pulisic is my spirit animal.

Way to erase a -5 GD in one game. Now get a win in Panama and right back into qualifying position as if the 1st 2 qualifiers never happened.

 

[Raspewtin]

lol I love sports

Arsenal KMS

PSG KMS

everything KMS

 

[McD37]

Guys, how is soccer in US? Does it still grow in popularity? As a kid I always wondered why you are not more succesful in soccer since you are great at almost every sport South Korea 2002 was one of the first big tournaments I can remember, was a big fan of your team and especially Landon Donovan .

 

[YetAnotherNorwegian]

Guys, how is soccer in US? Does it still grow in popularity? As a kid I always wondered why you are not more succesful in soccer since you are great at almost every sport South Korea 2002 was one of the first big tournaments I can remember, was a big fan of your team and especially Landon Donovan .

Ever since I saw this, it pops up in my mind when someone mentions USA and football/soccer.



To be honest tho, I have grown very fond of Am. football and generally catch the Giants game each week. Same thing regarding baseball, this is by no means meant to bash anything.

Without trying to step on any toes, I wonder if it might be because soccer/football isn't "theirs". Am. football, basket, baseball and hockey were all born in North America, so the feeling of ownership and patriotism comes into play.

Since those four are so big, the American leagues are also by far the best in the world. That's probably a huge factor as well. If you can go watch am. football, baseball, basket or hockey at the top level, why would you care about a, compared to many Euro and South American ones, mediocre soccer league? If I wasn't raised to love soccer, I know I wouldn't. (I have no illusions that the Norwegian one is any better. We were once ranked second best among the national teams and were flooding top Euro leagues with players. Now we are absolute crap).

 

[Beer League Sniper]

America sucks at soccer because our best athletes, by and large, choose to play other sports. For much of the rest of the world, their elite athletes choose soccer.

Americans also don't seem to care about leagues that aren't top level of competition, which the MLS certainly isn't.

edit: Hockey in America also suffers from a dearth of physical talent. The best American hockey player, Patrick Kane, would get murdered playing American football. All while the Canada, a country with 10% of the population of America, routinely ices a bigger, stronger, faster team in international tournaments.

A physical talent like LeBron or Gronk would annihilate the NHL, but they chose more popular sports.

 

[BlueshirtBlitz]

What keeps me from fully embracing soccer is that the schedules are difficult to follow if you're just giving it a cursory glance, for both an American trying to watch Euro games and when I tried to keep up with Red Bulls games.

I like watching the national team in the WC and hope Pulisic is the real deal.

 

[007]

Ever since I saw this, it pops up in my mind when someone mentions USA and football/soccer.



To be honest tho, I have grown very fond of Am. football and generally catch the Giants game each week. Same thing regarding baseball, this is by no means meant to bash anything.

Without trying to step on any toes, I wonder if it might be because soccer/football isn't "theirs". Am. football, basket, baseball and hockey were all born in North America, so the feeling of ownership and patriotism comes into play.

Since those four are so big, the American leagues are also by far the best in the world. That's probably a huge factor as well. If you can go watch am. football, baseball, basket or hockey at the top level, why would you care about a, compared to many Euro and South American ones, mediocre soccer league? If I wasn't raised to love soccer, I know I wouldn't. (I have no illusions that the Norwegian one is any better. We were once ranked second best among the national teams and were flooding top Euro leagues with players. Now we are absolute crap).

Purely on the subject of the word "football", I like to think of it this way:

A long time ago, a friend whose dad is a preacher told me "Christianity isn't one religion, it is many religions that are Christian." In the same way, Football isn't one sport, but many codes that are football. They've all evolved from a game called football that was played in Great Britain in some form or another since medieval times. If you do a little scratching of the surface, it's fascinating to see how they're all related. All the sports developed in the second half of the 19th century. The below comes from the top of my head, so any or all of it might be wrong:

Rugby Football - the first to have its rules codified (at the Rugby School);
Canadian Football - derived from Rugby, it introduced the concept of being able to throw the ball forward once per sequence ("down");
American Football - developed alongside the Canadian sport, it had one more down (the 4th down) and moved the goalposts behind the end-zones;
Australian Rules Football - the rules developed early on, separately from the other codes. Maintains some vestiges of the early game, such as not being able to advance the ball while carrying it or throw (that's why they bounce the ball every few steps, and how the handball - where you punch the ball to your teammate - evolved);
Gaelic Football - looks a lot like early versions of Association Football, with players being able to catch the ball (but not advance it) and score in two different ways (into a goal or through tall goalposts);
Association Rules Football - went through a lot of evolution before they eliminated the tall goalposts, came up with a round ball, banned catching the ball or being able to pass it with your hands. The game was developed in Sheffield, Cambridge University, and London (by the nascent FA) "Soccer" is turn-of-the-20th-Century Cambridge slang for "Association".

As you can see, all the sports developed together, and if you ask me, none of them have the right to use the word "football" exclusively.

 

[sabremike]

Headed on the ESC bus down to Chester this Saturday to see Metro stomp the trolls under the bridge.

 

[jniklast]

America sucks at soccer because our best athletes, by and large, choose to play other sports. For much of the rest of the world, their elite athletes choose soccer.

Americans also don't seem to care about leagues that aren't top level of competition, which the MLS certainly isn't.

edit: Hockey in America also suffers from a dearth of physical talent. The best American hockey player, Patrick Kane, would get murdered playing American football. All while the Canada, a country with 10% of the population of America, routinely ices a bigger, stronger, faster team in international tournaments.

A physical talent like LeBron or Gronk would annihilate the NHL, but they chose more popular sports.

Athleticism isn't the be all end all, especially in soccer. Look at the best player in the world and you know that you don't need the body of LeBron to be good.

 

[sabremike]

Heads up: Ireland play Mexico on June 1st at PSL Park (aka MetLife) in a friendly. Tickets are going for $20 on secondary markets. My last name is Carroll so you bet I will be there!!!

 

[ecemleafs]

Heads up: Ireland play Mexico on June 1st at PSL Park (aka MetLife) in a friendly. Tickets are going for $20 on secondary markets. My last name is Carroll so you bet I will be there!!!

I saw ireland and Mexico play in the mid 90s at giants stadium. Think it ended 2-2. Game got rowdy in out section lol.

 

[Machinehead]

That was depressing. The Champions League is sort of depressing tbh.

It's slowly becoming the "Finish Second to Madrid" League.

And if any team has a chance in hell, it's Barcelona.

Gone are days of winners like Liverpool, Porto, Hamberg, or Ajax. You can forget that.

Even Milan, Inter, and Man United's time is likely over.

Realistically, it's Bayern, Juve, Barca, and Real. And when Bayern and Juve are underdogs, you've reached a sad state.

The only team left with a realistic chance to win it that would have any sort of magic to it is Athletico Madrid.

 

[Pavel Buchnevich]

Thats the way non-salary capped sports works. You're a Yankees fan, you should know how it is.

I'd be in favor of some type of salary cap. Not like a hard cap, but something that would make some of these leagues more competitive, as well as the Champions League.

 

[Cassano]

It's fine as it is. Don't need to Americanize every sport out there.