Soccer Nations

I was thinking - (Which is never a good thing!) - about

I'll try that again without hitting return!!

I was thinking about all the nations that have suddenly came good in terms of football.

Look at Turkey, Wales to name but a few.

If they were really interested I reckon the Yanks could be amazing.

Although they do my nut right in!!

What's your views??

Popular post eh Scotsman - No responses!!

Oops talking to myself - I think I'm going schizophrenic.

Which leads me nicely to my love poem

Roses are red
Violets are blue
I'm schizophrenic and so am I

go on so, can't have a man talking to himself!

i'm in the states at the moment and i agree with your point that they could have a great international side, they have great athletic programmes in the schools but the interest in soccer (as they call it) isn't there. it's still perceived very much as a women's sport.

the most famous soccer players here are mia hamm (u.s. womens captain) and brandy chastain (who whipped the top off after scoring the penalty that won the US the world cup, an image that made the cover of time and newsweek in the US). Interest in male soccer players has reached a fever pitch this summer as people who are accompanying their teenage daughters to the cinema find out who "Bend it like Beckham" is about.

by the time most lads reach their mid teens they've already opted for one of the big four, basketball, baseball, american football or ice hockey, the money and interest in these is huge, they are ubiquitous on tv, and for kids, the role models lie in these sports, there are no real idols in men's soccer, despite the good showing in the last world cup.

the set-up of professional sports in the us doesn't help either, there are no divisions, just franchised teams (who can move from city to city). eg- there are only 32 pro basketball teams in the fifty states (less soccer teams), and california has three of them. there is no real grassroots in sports, it's all based in schools not clubs, if your school doesn't have a soccer team, forget it, if they do and you haven't made the grade at college level then you spend the rest of your life selling used cars at crazy al's chevy imporium.

i've been to some games here and the standard is brutal, cork city would give most of them a run (of not a hiding). i live in a city of over one million and the average home attendance is less than two thousand, and the majority of those are english, scottish and irish (like myself) ex-pats looking for a game of ball. the largest attendance for a soccer game here since the 94 was last month for mexico -v- US in houston, TX and if immigration had raided the place there would have been ten americans left in the stands. basically, unless they change attitudes and development of the game then they'll never put out the sides they could.

which brings me to turkey, it's not that long since turkey were the whipping boys of every group they entered, trounced eight nil with alarming regularity, what they did to remedy this was to develop the underage teams of their brilliantly supported domestic teams. traditionally turkish players hadn't been popular abroad, but by slowly improving the standard of the domestic league the created a healthier crop of players and are now reaping the benefits, remember, galatasary in a euro club final (with ten turks in the starting line up) came first.

wales are doing great, but i think it might smack of irelands initial success under charlton as (and i might be wrong, often am) they seem to let people play now who've eaten leek soup. still, the bulk of the team is welsh and they've always produced great players (especioally strikers) and perhaps the recent decline in rugby standards is related to their new found football success.

the same can be said of the former ussr, initially these teams were their groups losers but as time has gone on the eastern block countries have emerged as real talents, latvia and slovakia are looking good to go to portugal, it took a while for these countries to establish their identity and then to put money into sport and they're now reaping the reward.

basically, there are fewer and fewer sure things in football, and on the whole it's a good thing, you can argue that the same teams always qualify and win, but the gulf at the lower levels has closed up, and while pele's prediction of an african world cup winner has not come true, football worldwide is healthy.

now, my arms are knackered so i hope that does as a response to you, we wouldn't want you to think we're leaving you out ;) .

Great post mate.

Hear what your saying.

I would love thet Yanks to play the English and hammer them.

In saying that I wouold love Scotland to do the same.

There's maybe a chance of us meeting again in a play-off.

Bring it on!!

remember the headline when england lost to the US in the graham taylor era

Yanks 2 Planks 0 :D

The yanks only hurt themselves.

Fredy Adu the 13 year old playing for the US u-17 team signed a one million dollar endorsement contract with Nike a few weeks ago. Anybody who shows a bit of talent gets money thrown at them which surely doesn't help the development of players motivationally speaking as Rico would say.

didn't hear about that, but he wouldn't be the first kid to be ruined by an endorsements contract over here.