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Why isn't the U.S. better at soccer?

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Re: Why isn't the U.S. better at soccer?

#81

Post by michtzik »

The article at one point says "No two members of the 26-man roster play on the same club team" about the USMNT.

However, it seems that these two players both play for PSV Eindhoven: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergi%C3%B1o_Dest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ricardo_Pepi And also these two players both play for Borussia Mönchengladbach: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Scally https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giovanni_Reyna

Is the article wrong? This is the only claim I bothered to check. Should I assume the rest is wrong, too?

Re: Why isn't the U.S. better at soccer?

#82

Post by jandrewrogers »

pier25 wrote: post #59

It's the culture. I'm from Spain and living in Mexico. Football in these countries is almost like a religion.

Yet Mexico is no better at soccer than America, broadly speaking. There is also a general feeling that in the US is better at developing talent than Mexico at this point. Some of Mexico's best national team prospects in recent years were developed by MLS academies.

Re: Why isn't the U.S. better at soccer?

#83

Post by Symbiote »

jasonwatkinspdx wrote: post #79
SamBam wrote: post #19

I don't think the article really tried to answer the question, though maybe that wasn't its intent and the author was genuinely asking. I think an answer would need to look at the difference in how kids and teens play soccer in the US vs other countries. In the US soccer is mostly a younger kids' sport, and is generally highly structured, with kids playing on teams once or twice a week. Compare to Europe, where many…

Yeah, this difference occurred to me while traveling in rural Mexico. To play soccer all you need is a ball. So you can go into the poorest villages that have little in the way in infrastructure and all the kids are playing soccer in the dirt road or a random field, etc. And often enough adults join in because they were once the kids too. So it's this very pervasive, almost universal shared experience there. Totally…

Cricket is even more accessible: you need a bat (which could be a piece of wood), but you don't need space. You can compress the game to play in a 1.5m wide alleyway between two buildings.

I think this is why it became so popular in India etc.

Re: Why isn't the U.S. better at soccer?

#85

Post by confidantlake »

SamBam wrote: post #19

I don't think the article really tried to answer the question, though maybe that wasn't its intent and the author was genuinely asking. I think an answer would need to look at the difference in how kids and teens play soccer in the US vs other countries. In the US soccer is mostly a younger kids' sport, and is generally highly structured, with kids playing on teams once or twice a week. Compare to Europe, where many…

I think you are overlooking the more obvious answer. All the talent gets sucked up by the nfl/nba/mlb.

Re: Why isn't the U.S. better at soccer?

#86

Post by pertymcpert »

radiator wrote: post #70
haunter wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you describe is pretty much true for every single american sport too >unprecedented levels of gambling Welcome to FanDuel and DraftKings >insane amount of efforts from the youth chasing the dream of professional football Look at college sports, it's actually even more insane than anything else in Europe >corruption where magnate owners of sports clubs use their popularity to influence politics Look at how public…

OK I 've never been to the US, so I believe you. Then the problems are more widespread: not only soccer, but professional sports in general are harmful in my opinion.

I really have to disagree with you there. Football's damage to society, which I no doubt does exist, much less than the damage due to class divide and capitalism as a whole.

Football in England is sometimes demonized by the media, but specifically footballers. Footballers have historically been the punching bag of the low brow media. "Rio Ferdinand on 150k a week does something bad". "Wayne Rooney caught in latest scandal, 200k a week ace in shambles" etc etc. They love to mention how much they earn, but they never talk about how football is one of the very remaining professions which are purely meritocratic. The few professions where talent is enough and offers social mobility. Most footballers are working class and yet they're blamed, and football is blamed too.

But what's so bad about something that brings people together to bond over a game? Hooligan violence isn't really a thing anymore. Gambling is a separate issue. It's not football's fault that people like to gamble. The politicians could make it illegal.

Re: Why isn't the U.S. better at soccer?

#87

Post by temp_praneshp »

surgical_fire wrote: post #69
drewmate wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same is basically true for most other sports in the US too, and yet there are still high-level Americans. Certainly baseball (which other countries do still play in a limited fashion), hockey and football. With football we are undisputed world champs for the last 60 years! Joking aside, there is no doubt that high-level NFL players are seriously talented and their whole sport revolves around structured practices…

The thing is that the US team sports you can think of such Baseball or American Football, have nearly no popularity outside of the US. Maybe Baseball in places like Japan or Venezuela. Maybe the only parallel to soccer I can think of is sports like Rugby in UK and some English-speaking countries, Cricket in India, and some sports endemic to countries (such as GAA in Ireland). The best way to compare the US to other c…

Basketball?

Re: Why isn't the U.S. better at soccer?

#89

Post by alex0015 »

haunter wrote: post #11

I know it's an American article but I think it's far more interesting that 4 out of the 5 most populous countries (China, India, Pakistan, Indonesia), representing 3.3 billion people and 40% of the Earth’s population, has a combined total of 2 appearances at the World Cup (1938 Indonesia as Dutch East Indies and 2002 China). It’s a huge untapped market and not that people don’t love or care about football in those co…

All I know to write about here is China: school is one massive obstacle for professional sports. Lots of kids in China try out tons of different hobbies and sports, and any sport or activity you can think of likely has a number of clubs in bigger cities, enough to create a community of people with a serious interest. I'm thinking of Chinese kids I know personally who are into football, breakdancing, archery, ballet, drama, all kinds of stuff.

And then, right at a child's age where European scouts are noticing kids over there, in China parents are hit with massive, massive pressure to help their kids academically as best they can. Good middle school -> good high school -> good university -> good job. Unless your kid is far and away a natural talent easily exceeding their peers, you're going to hesitate to let them devote more time to professionally developing athletic ability. Athletic competition at the highest levels in China is intense due to the number of natural talents you get in a large population, and with every year that goes by without your kid quite making it into the professional-athlete track, the pressure gets higher to abandon that track and focus on academics.

So the athletic practice, even for a quite promising kid, gets sidelined for more study time and after-school classes. And this happens even for kids with parents who want them to have a balanced life without the insane pressure for academics the Chinese school system is known for. For those families it just takes the shape of cutting back the athletic practice instead of nurturing it to a possibly professional level.

One other factor that I can think of is just a culture of family interest. I don't know any Chinese men older than 45 who are into watching sports at all, whereas in the West (and also India, I think?) it's common for a family interest in sports to have already existed for generations. I do know Chinese men my age (31) who are into basketball and have young kids who might grow up with that interest. That's all anecdotal, I know, but my sample is big enough for it to be surprising to me in comparison to other places.

Re: Why isn't the U.S. better at soccer?

#90

Post by [deleted] »

harrall wrote: post #37
SamBam wrote: post #19

I don't think the article really tried to answer the question, though maybe that wasn't its intent and the author was genuinely asking. I think an answer would need to look at the difference in how kids and teens play soccer in the US vs other countries. In the US soccer is mostly a younger kids' sport, and is generally highly structured, with kids playing on teams once or twice a week. Compare to Europe, where many…

The US has also strangely invented a lot of sports (Americans football, basketball, baseball, volleyball, lacrosse, skateboarding, snowboarding, and so on). Soccer has major competition in the US. Because these sports started in America too, America usually dominates them.

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