Wednesday, with the future at stake (as always, as ever), there was something claustrophobic about the final games of the group stage. The ether was jammed with possibility. Algeria’s nascent glory after the sixth-minute strike … that didn’t happen here, but its universe and ours shouldered past each other; America’s rippling, riotous three-goal first half (full of clever touches) didn’t happen here either, although it wasn’t much farther away. These millions upon millions of others, lingering in nearby space-time, echoes from the past, the future, all bumping for a place at the table, their jostling rippling out until the atmosphere seemed taut with a subsonic humming of futures.
I’ve read for more than a quarter-century about the sensuality of football’s slow buildup, the orgasmic howling of the crowd, but it wasn’t until about noon Eastern time yesterday that I experienced it in truth. And I’m guessing I’m not alone. Americans are not an empirical bunch. When W talked about leading “from my gut,” he was met not with sneers of derision but general approbation. It’s almost too perfect—any movie script that ended the group stages this way would demand a rewrite. “This should be the final; Donovan’s tears should be while holding the Jules Rimet Trophy; how about a bit about a dog” are the producer notes.
In terms of defining a narrative for this team, well, that work is done. This is the team we’re sending out there to represent us to the world in the world’s game: hard-working, gritty, passionate, just a bit pretty, and maybe still a bit naïve. And when events turn against them, ironically, it’s Churchill who gives the inspiration: “Never, never, never, never give up.”
In a nation where one working person out of nine isn’t, a nation where we can’t shake the feeling our wealth is an elaborate con, there is something pure and redemptive about the simple refusal to surrender. We have seen the plunder of a generation siphoned off by crooks and charlatans, seen our democratic institutions trivialized, seen our neighbors turned against each other by the deafening blare of propaganda; how refreshing, then, to see these men face misfortune and refuse to stagger under the weight of it. Landon Donovan, our nation turns its hopeful eyes to you.
Sean Spence lives in Flint, Michigan, with his wife Sarah, three step-daughters, and four cats.
by Sean Spence · June 24, 2010
A lovely post.
Hard-working, gritty, yes — and extremely well-conditioned. What pleased me most about that winning goal was the way that, at the end of an unusually frantic ninety minutes, four American players sprinted the full length of the pitch to confront the Algerian center-backs and keeper. That’s pretty impressive.
Nice piece Sean. Love the perspective. The US team has fallen victim to some bad calls, yet have won in spite of them. I think that befits this team and these times.
Thanks for posting this on CM Sarah.
@Alan Jacobs Good point, Alan.
Full disclosure: I’m still firmly ensconced among the (dwindling) ranks of Landon Doubters, but whatever. Great day, great result.
But what strikes me most is nothing as stirring as Sean’s paean to the redemptive power of sport. (This just isn’t the 1980 US Hockey Team to me.) It’s something far more quotidian: The USMNT is just fitter than everyone they’ve played — in some cases what seems like quite a lot. They seemed most threatening against England when the clock ticked down; they made second-half Slovenia look like scarecrows; and they ran Algeria ragged, exploiting the game’s chaos by dint of superior energy.
Perhaps this is a story of will, or redemption, or the triumph of the American spirit. But I think it’s just that Bradley has them fit.
@Sparkle Motion! What is there left to doubt about Landon? Believe me, I don’t love him as a person but what does he still have to prove? Sure he had the failed stints in Germany but he also has the tremendously successful time at Everton and his numerous exploits with the USMNT. Granted, he’s had plenty of “right place right time” moments (though there’s something to be said for actually being able to be at the right place at the right time), but so have all great players. I don’t see an argument against him being the greatest American soccer player of this era and very possibly of all time. Reyna deserves a big mention especially for his exploits in Europe but Donovan is the cream of the crop for me.
Over forty years I’ve played soccer here in America and still compete in a city league. I’ve even traveled with the US team in ’94 and attended over half dozen matches during our first ever hosting of the World Cup. Magical.
Some of us are missing a clear sense of the scope of change and improvement that shows American soccer has emerged and matured to a full fledged sport. For me I saw that it happened during one seminal event–the US team 2-3 loss to Brazil in last year’s Confederations Cup. And not for the reason you think.
US play on the field in the final paled in terms of the reactions I witnessed in the local pub: my entire life I’ve been surrounded by foreign born players and spectating people more interested in cheering for OTHER countries than the US team in every soccer match. But at last year’s cup final it was the FIRST time I saw EVERYONE in the pub cheering for the US team–we’ve finally been accepted at home. Even Americans wearing Brazilian jerseys seemingly converted during that match and DID NOT CHEER for Brazil. It was amazing in that during the elapsed playing time of those 90 minutes American spectators galvanized their identity, invested their hearts and found something to enduringly love about US soccer. It was an electrifying moment, but it had been decades in the making. We now have a soccer home to come home to.
So the US team is on another world stage and ready to make the next drama and tragedy felt by millions more expectant hearts at home. That we must suffer so much pre-pubescent opinion about the whys and wherefores of the US team as a team and addled forensics regarding this play and that play and fitness levels and blah blah blah are all just further indications that the overwhelmingly deep swell that has taken years has finally come ashore. Now we must ignore niggardly commentary about our team–who cares– and cheer as US team players swim further and further upstream until we finally spawn a champion in the hallowed riverbed that is the World Cup. And it will happen in time.
We are most certainly coming home to a purity of origins we all share as Americans and citizens of soccer. We are just as much a part of the global river of joy that is futbol as any other nation. Now our passage upstream offers our redemption. Yet each victory we gain is also something the rest of the world must learn to not over-dramatize as a reckoning. We are simply playing soccer with all the great humanistic themes that comprise tragedy and comedy in sport.
So let the US team regale us and everyone that cares to watch. I’m just going to enjoy it all as it comes; we’re the lucky ones to be here as American soccer returns to the origins of greatness and joy we all share in the beautiful game.
It WAS dramatic, Sean, I watched Donovan’s goal in your parents’ basement. Bravo USA!
Well put. Very nicely written.