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America’s Forgotten Soccer History

Posted by on Wednesday, June 9th, 2010 at 12:35 pm in Diary | 4

Good stuff as every from erstwhile Pitch Invasion contributor and Run of Play maestro Brian Phillips, posting at Slate on the forgotten shooting star that was American soccer in the 1920s:

In the 1920s, soccer was big in America. Not big in the way that baseball was big (this was the era of Ruth and Gehrig) or college football was big (these were the days when Ivy League rivalries played out as violent eruptions in the mud), but at its height, the top American soccer league had tens of thousands of fans, featured some of the world’s best players, and looked set to challenge the fledgling NFL in the competition to supply the nation with a post-October pastime. Along the way, this country’s early soccer entrepreneurs also managed to alienate the United States from the international soccer community, lay the groundwork for America’s greatest moment of World Cup glory, and generally create one of the most bizarre and fascinating might-have-beens in U.S. sports history.

Read the rest.

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Tom Dunmore is the founder of Pitch Invasion. Originally from Brighton, England, he's now resident in Chicago. He is also the editor of Stadium Porn and the author of the Historical Dictionary of Soccer. Follow Tom @pitchinvasion on Twitter.
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4 Comments

  1. Sean
    June 9, 2010 • 1:54 pm

    Yeah, great stuff as always from Brian. I particularly love that the ethos of the teams tracked so perfectly the careening, hell-bent nature of the Roaring 20s.

    Did anyone else read Dave Eggers’ ‘effort’? Oy. I guess a brother’s gotta get paid, but what a phoned-in, clueless, hipster-common-knowledge piece of dreck that is. Americans think it’s just not right to leave out your hands? And the horrible diving? Did he even have to wait for his computer to boot up while he thought this shit up? I’m guessing no. The piece reads like it was written during a phone call with his agent, perhaps the same phone call that began with the solicitation of same. Urgh.

  2. A. Ruiz
    June 9, 2010 • 3:32 pm

    That Dave Egger piece is a reprint from that book of WC essays that came out last world cup, totally recycled crap.
    So the answer is “No. No, he didnt”. So disappointing, but then he’s the guy responsible for “you shall know our velocity”, so its clear he’s been phoning it in for awhile.

    I would rather they print Brian Philips columns on Beautiful game or how it’s not but we hope it is anyway.

    http://www.runofplay.com/2008/08/30/what-do-we-mean-when-we-call-football-the-beautiful-game/

    http://www.runofplay.com/2008/09/01/the-beautiful-game-part-two/

    He rivals Galeano in those pieces. Maybe even outdoes him, but I’ll have to read in sun and shadow in Spanish first to make up my mind on that. Maybe it’s just a shitty translation. Either way, the Run of Play is amazing.