11/05/24
June 08, 2006
For the U.S., tight security is just a day at the beach.: Try getting ready for kickoff with uniformed militia guarding the field holding ready-to-fire machine guns. Try scoring a goal with rocks, batteries and bottles flying toward you.
posted by Texan_lost_in_NY to soccer at 05:55 PM - 12 comments
Have another drink, squealy. You become more attractive with each one.
posted by Texan_lost_in_NY at 07:48 PM on June 08, 2006
I've had rocks thrown at me at football games in high school... and I was in the band. But I feel for those guys. Going where you aren't wanted, playing a sport where you aren't accepted in your home country for successes... I hope we do well in group.
posted by igottheblues at 08:12 PM on June 08, 2006
They're not going to make it out of the group stage anyway.
posted by Drood at 12:03 AM on June 09, 2006
They might - you never can tell what Italian team is going to turn up - the bigger problem is that unless they make it out by winning the group (which looks unlikely), they would play Brazil in the second round. The article was interesting. It hadn't really occurred to me that the US team would have to face that kind of thing. To be fair to squealy mind you, there was an element of wide-eyed "Holy cow! There are people out there who don't like us!" about it at times. Having been fair to squealy, I'd also like to add that Wales couldn't get out of a wet paper bag, let alone CONCACAF.
posted by JJ at 06:20 AM on June 09, 2006
I thought the article was pretty inconsistent. The fourth paragraph contains a lot of unsubstantiated claims of bad fan behaviour towards the US, but when it comes time for substantiated events, the best it's got is a Gatorade commercial:
In another clip a fan held a massive sheet that read, "Yankees Go Home."Ooooh, signs, scary.
posted by qbert72 at 07:17 AM on June 09, 2006
Now you know how the Iranians felt in 1998. Or the French, in, uh, pick a year. England as I recall is also mercilessly booed outside of Europe (and inside it too - and by their own fans). Or we could just chalk it up to a few nasties and dismiss it as unimportant. Which I feel is probably best.
posted by WeedyMcSmokey at 09:19 AM on June 09, 2006
It's not uncommon at all, especially when a country can paste it as a giant "F-You, rich bastards!" I went to a CONCACAF qualifier in San Pedro Sula, Honduras in 2001 when Mexico came in, and it was definitely the same mentality. Honduras wound up winning 3-0, IIRC, and it was as hostile of an environment that I'd care to be in. The small section of Mexicans that were in the stands (as opposed to sitting up in the box seats) were surrounded by police donning riot gear pretty much the whole game, and were ushered out with a full fifteen minutes left to play. Anecdotal? Sure. But this is something far from being unique to the US players.
posted by Ufez Jones at 09:43 AM on June 09, 2006
got a question: back in september '01 we played at RFK vs. honduras in front of 54,000+. did we really throw smokebombs on the field like sam's army said we did?????? they say something about a rumor that US soccer was fined by FIFA for that. the reason i say that is now IMO we need our fans to start misbehaving. i don't advocate real violence that would put us below the poles and english on the subhuman level, but stuff like disabling the A/C in the visitor's locker room before the game, jacking a wheel off the team bus on the way to the game, or waking up mexico in their hotel rooms on the night before a match, like the famous "project mayhem". mischeivous stuff. stuff like that IMO would go a long way toward proving that american soccer fans aren't wimps and soccer moms like the world perceives us to be. fact is, the world has made an obsession over this game, probably because it's the only one we haven't mastered yet. but we're getting there.
posted by chalmetteowl at 04:58 AM on June 11, 2006
fact is, the world has made an obsession over this game probably because it's the only one we haven't mastered yet. Errr, yes and then no.
posted by Mr Bismarck at 07:49 AM on June 11, 2006
You started interesting, then faded. The world has been obsessed with soccer for generations upon generations, and it never had a thing to do with our participation. Of course, that's never stopped us from thinking we're the center of the universe, has it?
posted by The_Black_Hand at 10:30 AM on June 11, 2006
Of course, that's never stopped us from thinking we're the center of the universe, has it? What? The Continents don't revolve around North America?
posted by Folkways at 01:24 PM on June 11, 2006
Oh boo hoo. I'm crying inside, honest. The upside being of course that Wales could qualify from CONCACAF. Albeit behind Mexico.