The future of American soccer

The U.S. soccer team played its first World Cup game this summer against the Czech Republic. I was in New York City at the time, and I took in as much of the game as possible during my lunch break. I sat down in a typical food court area, one marked by small televisions and investment bankers in their early to mid-20s, one that could have been anywhere in the city.

Our team received a sound drubbing that day from the aging Czech team. The people around me, dressed uniformly in shirts, slacks, skirts and blouses, had a definite rooting interest in the game. They displayed a casual nationalism afforded to those who take full advantage of the opportunities their country provides.

After the team lost, these people were mildly crestfallen. There was no outright disgust. Support for soccer in America is not fanatical; it is still curious.

New York was the best place to be in America this summer for the World Cup. The masses are concentrated; sports bars litter the city; and the immigrant population displayed passion for and knowledge of the game. But these foreigners and their naturalized children do not help the game in America, where overall it is followed too loosely. They have their own soccer traditions based on the social, economic and political conditions of their homelands.

Soccer is indigenous to their lands and what they bring to America is no better than contraband. We do not have our own way of playing the game; we are imitators, and poor ones at that.

I would say that the United States' World Cup challenge in 2006 was largely a failure. The Czech game, especially, displayed our fear and lack of identity. We have the athletes. We have the endurance. We lack the transcendental player; Landon Donovan is no Zidane, Ronaldinho or Wayne Rooney. And we lack the fans.

But there was a bright light this summer for our team in Germany, a player who is on the verge of greatness, but who more importantly represents the first indigenous American soccer player. He comes from the flip side of the American coin, the side opposite to that of the New York investment banker.

Clint Dempsey was born poor in Texas. His older sister died young. He could never afford the best cleats. He is not particularly fast or strong or powerful. He is skilled, but he is not the most skilled. He is scrappy and often violent. He is a born underdog, a true American success story.

It is no coincidence that these are the traits of many of the world's best players: Ronaldinho played barefoot in the sands of beautiful Brazilian beaches, and Rooney grew up on the gray streets of working-class Liverpool. Ronaldinho has his samba; Rooney his fearlessness. Dempsey is an American original because he brings the best of both worlds: he plays with the spirit of a Ronaldinho and the anger of a Rooney.

But he is no cheap imitation. Dempsey's uniqueness and his Americanness are undeniable. After all, he is an artist in his spare time. He is an athlete who lays his verse over a beat and talks about his troubles and overcoming them.

Dempsey is the soccer version of that stock American character, the inner city basketballer. He plays not because he loves the game, but because he is the game. He moves naturally on the soccer field, like a power forward gliding up the court to finish an alley-oop on a netless rim, and he understands more than any other American player the angles and timing of a good run into the box.

Dempsey's natural understanding of the game led to his thunderous goal against Ghana. He hit the ball better than any American had ever hit a ball in a competitive soccer match. More interestingly, he beat Donovan to the ball even though he was playing in a more reserved position and is not as fast as the former wunderkind.

Get the best of the ‘Prince’ delivered straight to your inbox. Subscribe now »

Donovan was once considered the great American soccer hope and his failure is instructive. In a sense, he represents American privilege. He could have been a great player, but he never had the mindset, just as the bankers in New York never had the mindset to be great fans. Donovan fled the trials and competitiveness of high-level club soccer in Germany for assured dominance in the MLS. As a soccer nation, America seems too comfortable.

Recently, Dempsey was dismayed to learn that he would not be heading to England to play in the Premiership, the top league in the world. Where Donovan shied away, he is chomping at the bit. Dempsey is only 23, though, and his time will come. And if others follow in his footsteps, so will America's.