Five days. It took me five days after the USMNT lost to Belgium to be able to read any of the many obituaries, encomia and tributes that followed in that match\’s wake. It took me five days before I could begin to think on the accomplishments of the US team and reflect on what had happened. It took me five days to get over it, to move on from it. As I watched the games on Friday and Saturday, as the quarterfinals became the semifinals, I did so not really believing the next game wouldn’t feature Dempsey, Howard, Bradley and Jones. Their...
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World Cup Preview: Belgium vs. USMNT
People will say that the US is lucky to be in the Round of 16. They’ll say, as we did, that Pepe, the Portugal centerback, had just as much to do with getting the US to the knockouts as anything any US player did. They’ll note that they faced a weakened Portugal and lost to a German team that really didn’t have much to play for in their match, the score as close as it was because the Germans didn’t need anything more than the 1-0 win they ended up with. They looked anything but convincing against Ghana, switched off at two...
Continue reading...The Knockout Game (not that knockout game): Weekend World Cup Preview
Yesterday was probably the happiest I\’ve ever been after watching my team lose, and J Reed\’s post yesterday in its aftermath summed up my feelings in words better than I could have put together (ed. note: that can\’t possibly be true). Because of the way the group stage is set up, all the US had to do yesterday was not lose badly, and they\’d see themselves through. Ghana helped by losing to Portugal, who needed to make up considerably more goals than the Black Stars would have. The US weathered the first fifteen minutes, which was one wave after...
Continue reading...Thank God Pepe Was an Idiot so the U.S. Could Advance, or WHOOO DID WE WIN THE WORLD CUP YET?
Sunday, I was ready to celebrate the U.S. advancing to the next stage of the World Cup. I was watching USA-Portugal at my favorite local, managing to get seats at the bar because I’m overly punctual and anxious. Portgual was looking if not worse for wear, at least potentially beatable. I was surrounded by perhaps a hundred rabid and drunk-since-brunch USA fans, a group that was made more fun by the addition of about ten unafraid Portugal fans. It\’s always more fun watching your side win when fans of the opposing side are nearby. Because schadenfreude. Then Portugal score that first...
Continue reading...On Omens and Destiny and Fate: US-Germany Preview
I woke up this morning to find that the air conditioner in my bedroom had leaked inside and bubbled the paint under the window. I took the dog for a walk, hoping to get coffee, and he stepped on my foot and sliced upon my big toe. The first coffee place had a line about 12 deep, and the dog doesn’t have that kind of patience, I was at the second spot for about two minutes, ready to place my order, when I saw him jumping at strangers and heard him barking. Walking home, coffee-less and in pain, wondering...
Continue reading...Stoppage Time Blues: Weekend World Cup Recap and Day 12 Preview
I had to work until 8pm on Sunday. It was a terrible oversight on my part, the result of planning six months ahead, and requiring me to miss out on watching the USMNT take on Portugal in real time. Aside from Nani’s 5th minute goal, following an absolutely calamitous attempted clearance by Geoff Cameron, I avoided spoilers. I listened to nothing on the hour-long drive home and turned my phone off, lest someone assume I hadn’t made the terrible decision of trying to remain gainfully employed rather than watch a soccer game. As I approached my neighborhood, I realized...
Continue reading...Pepe Has a Case of the Mondays: Day Five Review/ Day Six Preview
An eventful Monday began just 10 minutes after noon, when João Pereira brought down Mario Götze in the Portuguese 18 yard box, conceding a penalty and drawing a yellow card for his troubles. A little over fifteen minutes later, Portugal’s striker Hugo Almeida grabbed his hamstring and exited the match, swiftly followed by another German goal — this tally from Mats Hummels — and then, well, Pop covered this yesterday: What you can’t see from that angle is the referee staring directly at them as it occurs, nor the incident that preceded it, for which this was...
Continue reading...Quick Take: Portugal’s Pepe Gets Himself Red Carded for Being Stupid
Portguese midfielder Pepe just got himself red-carded for head-butting German attacking midfielder Thomas Muller. https://vine.co/v/MIdTOXbzzTe DID PORTUGAL\’S PEPE HEADBUTT THOMAS MÜLLER OR FORCE HIM TO JOIN THE ILLUMINATI? #WorldCup2014 pic.twitter.com/3Lnh2Io5Lz — STOP THE ILLUMINATI (@Illuminati_Stop) June 16, 2014 That makes three remarkably stupid red cards so far in this tournament, but this one might be the dumbest. That said, this is good for Team USA, as Portugal were favorites before, but no longer.
Continue reading...Anatomy of a Goal (and Day Five Previews)
Before we get to anything else, we need to talk about this: [this space used to be filled with a gif of a goal but sadly has fallen to internet rot] I know, it happened on Friday and there have been eleventy billion matches between then and now. But try to remember. Try to remember when Spain and the Netherlands were playing one another in a tense and competitive soccer match, rather than Iker Casillas’ nightmare and a “performance that sang of the glue factory.” Before this moment, it looked as if Spain was going to head...
Continue reading...We Start … From Here
Seventy years ago, the United States became a world superpower. Historians can point to any number of events that brought the US to that point, and its ascendancy was, if not inevitable, at least likely, long before thousands of its men washed upon the shores of Normandy. The war would devastate Europe in a way that it would not the US. China and Japan would take years to recover. The rest of Asia, Africa and much of South America would spend decades emerging from the colonial yokes under which they labored. Only the US, across a sea,...
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