PAULMAY said:
What a difference 4 years makes
When I joined this Board 4 years ago, was mainly to meet other US soccer fans that were complaining about the lack of Footie on the Telly. US natl team games were not televised so others would get the minuet by minuet transcripts and post them here, or if they were lucky enough to purchase it on PPV they would keep us updated here.
I find it still hard to believe that we have people here that wont remember a time when the WC wasnt telivised at all. Or when it was the match was interupted every 15 minuets for a commercial, they would come back and you missed a goal.
And yes our commentators would spend more time explaining the rules of the game then play by play.
I remember a match in the
96 wc on ABC where they were explaining the rules of a goal kick meanwhile the kick was taken and a goal was scored while they were explaining the kick. No emotion and no passion. Many of us tuned into Telemundo to watch the games.
Now I may not get to see an EPL side in the CL match every week, or Spain play Hungry. But I do get to see a CL match and I now see the US in every International match they play. I can turn on my telly every day and watch footie, and if you go back just 4 years ago that was not possable.
Wow, there was a World Cup in 96, Paul? I seriously missed something. :eekani:
Seriously, great post, as it reminds us of a time when we were not so lucky to be able to see so much great football all of the time.
My first experiences to European football were through my aunt's house. She was relatively wealthy so she had Fox Sports World in it's early days, and every time I would go there I would watch it for hours, just hoping to catch a game and delighting in every moment I got to see. It was just so good, these players were doing things I didn't think were possible. I was only 10 or 11 when I started watching, and had only been playing organised football for about three years, so I still knew very little. It was a wonderful learning experience.
I began to thirst more and more for the games, but it's not like I could live there.
I would go to her house after church whenever I could, spend the night there on Mondays, and go there if I was sick. However, I could never get there as often as I wanted. But being the wonderful lady she was, she often taped games from the Premiership or Serie A (old indeed!) for me, and sometimes MLS and US National Team games on ESPN2. She never gave me very many tapes, but the ones I have I remember so well. I would watch the games over and over again, study it meticulously. It's one of the reason's I'm a good player now, because I loved watching it so much that I just kind of picked up little and big things from watching them play. I even remember the games she'd tape, I watched them so much.
Leicester City 2 - 0 Liverpool in the year the Reds won the Mickey Mouse treble, Ade Akinbiyi and Muzzy Izzet were the scorers, and I used to love to wear my collars flipped up like Izzet did after he scored. (Not knowing of Cantona) I remember a Lazio versus Brescia game at Brescia where Brescia had just come off of thise 2-2 draw with Fiorentina when Baggio scored two goals. On the day Dario Huvner had many chances but missed them all and it was 0-0 at half time when my uncle changed the channel to some movie. I also had old MLS games, the likes. It was an absolute blast.
I remember full well a time when football wasn't so big here, but I still have amazing old memories from it. Holland 2 - 1 Argentina in 98 is one of my fondest memories, I remember running out in my yard to tell my dad about the goal Bergkamp scored, and talking with a Yugoslavian friend of ours two years later about it.
I remember the final, but not all of it! I remember Zidane's first goal, and how I was the only kid in the neighborhood supporting France, as in America everyone loves Brasil (And Manchester United.) Amazingly enough, I left after the Zizou header to go play kickball with a friend of mine! We tried to get our mates to play with us, but they were all watching the World Cup Final. For some reason, I didn't care!
I still caught Blanc's last goal, although for years I thought he'd shot it from 40 yards for some reason. However on a tape I watched in 7th grade it confirmed it was the edge of the box, not halfway. I also remember Brasil's games versus Chile, when Ronaldo hit the bar when it would have been his hat trick, and the look his girlfriend had when they showed a replay of her. I remember the dissapointment of the loss to Germany, and I remember Brasil's wonderful game versus...Denmark? in the quarterfinals. That was a time when Brasil drew better than the USA on the telly.
I remember the nervousness everyone experienced when the American coverage was by no means guaranteed for 2002, the joy I got when I realised we would get it, and the pains I had to struggle through to get my parents to get cable so we'd have ESPN and ESPN2 for the World Cup. I remember waking up early to watch Senegal versus France, and dancing along with milloions of Senegalese people when the goal was scored. Unfortunately, I had to go before the game was over! That whole month was an amazing blur for me, as I watched every game of the tournament live, and thus destroyed my body. I remember screaming at our local ABC affiliate when they decided to air the FINAL tape-delayed because they "thought they'd get better numbers." The horror was terrible. Still a wonderful time in my life, to get to see so much football so often.
My best memories from the tournament will always be the American experiences though. I remember screaming at my dad at 3:00 in the morning that the USA was in front, and waking him up again every time we scored...he was so testy the next day. But still, I remember the next few days being surreal in the amazement of winning the match against a team we'd dreamt of drawing.
I remember dancing around the living room couch with my best friend at 2:30AM in the Korea game, doing the "happy dance" after Clint Mathis scored and after Friedel saved that penalty. I remember the heartbreak after we let in the goal, because I'd studied it so meticulously and a win would have put us through to the next round.
The last game I remember that we hooked up both of our TVs to the living room cable, and had a switch so we could watch either game on either TV. When Poland scored first, I was crushed. The Donovan equaliser dissalowed heartbreaking, and the second goal really ended my hopes. Their third, it's looking all over. Then, suddenly, amazement. The wonderful Korean goal, and suddenly we're back in the second round. Donovan scores, never mind, that game is over. Just prayer we'd go through. A shot hits the post, a shot goes marginally inches wide, my heart skipping a beat every time a shot was taken. But then, the final whistle, and the knowledge we were through. Amazing.
The game against Mexico was fantastic. Screaming at McBride's wonder goal, praising Friedel for his heroics. Yelling and praising the referee the whole match, then becoming more and more nervous as the Mexicans continued to dominate, but we still had that lead. My friend says to me "They need a goal." and less than a minute later Donovan heading home. Delight. We hold on, and we're through to the Quarterfinals.
Germany. I don't even want to go into it. I just remember waking up in a daze after earlier England versus Brasil, and struggling through the game. Screaming, and tears. I remember crying a few weeks later at my friends house when a game was on, thinking about how good our chances were of going all the way to the final if we'd made it past the Germans. Stupid referee...
Some of my memories from a different time in broadcasted football, and I'm sorry to go on a bit, but as I thought about the amount of football that used to be on and is now, I just thought a bit. Feel free to share other experiences of your own.
