Dear Daily Princetonian: Newsflash: The U.S. cares about soccer

Wearing the white jersey of the American national soccer team while surrounded by a crush of green, the color of the Mexican squad — I felt particularly alone. I had certainly been yelled at before, but I did not expect to be the subject of this much vitriol, at least not in a suburb of Manhattan, and certainly not for being an American soccer fan.

I’ll back up. My summer, for all intents and purposes, was pretty fun, but not too special: I was living in Princeton and commuting to Philadelphia for work most of the time. But it was made more interesting partly because my summer was framed by international soccer and highlighted by my firsthand view of what turned into one of the worst matches ever for the U.S. men’s soccer team.

First came the Champions League final back in May, which I watched in a good ol’ pub in St. Andrew’s, Scotland.

I got back to the states in time for Reunions and soon started my internship in Philadelphia. Major League Soccer had announced that the city was getting a team around the time I was starting work, but that buzz was shortly eclipsed by that surrounding the Phillies’ Cliff Lee and the Eagles’ Michael Vick. Philly, I learned, was not yet a soccer town. At the time, though, the U.S. soccer world at large was buzzing. The men’s national team had defeated world No. 1 Spain in June, and had taken mighty Brazil to the brink days later. Qualification for the 2010 World Cup was all but inevitable, and a victory in the forthcoming regional championship, the CONCACAF Gold Cup, seemed likely.

So it was with a sense of adventure and anticipation that a friend and I boarded the train to Baltimore on the afternoon of July 24th, half-hoping to see soccer finally embraced fully by the American populace. European giants AC Milan and Chelsea were facing off in the M&T Bank Stadium, which hosted a vibrant crowd of more than 70,000.

The match ended 2-1 in favor of Chelsea, and I left the stadium just in time for the last train back to New Jersey, consumed by what I had just seen — an electric atmosphere celebrating the convergence of two foreign sporting institutions on American soil.

Just two days later, I was back on the train, this time headed to Giants Stadium in East Rutherford to witness the U.S. national team take on bitter rival Mexico in the Gold Cup final.

The first half ended scoreless. I headed to the concessions stand confident, if wary, for the second half. As soon as I entered the bowels of the stadium, though, my heart dropped. Not only was the line for water much longer than I anticipated, it was populated exclusively by chanting Mexican fans, who were yelling Spanish profanities at Americans passing by in the very white jersey I had on.

It didn’t take long for the large, rather drunk man in a Mexican jersey behind me to start his heckling en espanol. He and his friends began to stare at me intently, and he soon began to pointedly berate me — repeatedly calling me “el fucking gringo,” a disparaging slang term for non-South or Central Americans.

Not feeling particularly confrontational, I didn’t respond at first, but his yelling grew louder. Finally, after at least five minutes of the abuse, I wheeled around and asked him — in Spanish — why he was under the impression that I couldn’t speak his language. Clearly taken aback, he and his compatriots fell silent. “Eh … fucking gringo?” was all he could muster in response.

Unfortunately, the hostilities between the two sets of fans carried on into the second half. The Mexican team scored three quick goals, and each time, their fans flung beer bottles at their American counterparts, me included. By the 75th minute, it was clear that the demoralized Americans on the field would not be able to scratch together a comeback. Nearly completely surrounded by a throbbing assembly of singing and chanting aficionados, my friend and I tried to squeeze our way out of the stadium.

As I was on the train back to Princeton that evening, I had time to reflect on that afternoon, and my summer of soccer. I had seen some pretty decent games on television and was lucky enough to witness a marquee matchup in person. But nothing could prepare me for the shellacking I was to see — the United States ended up losing, 5-0. As unpleasant as it may have been at the time, absorbing the insults may have been good for this “fucking gringo” in the end. It opened my eyes to a growing flicker of passion for the sport here in the states.