Soccer in a Football World

Soccer in a Football World tells the story of soccer in the United States from its 19th century roots through near oblivion to the 21st century optimism of MLS and regular World Cup appearances. Exhaustively researched and filled with interesting and obscure anecdotes, nonetheless Wangerin doesn’t get overly wrapped up in the details, always managing to keep one eye on the overall arc of the sport in the States. He brings back to life an early 20th century era in which soccer competed on an even footing with baseball and American football for the country’s sporting heart - and lost.

Many will be surprised to learn that soccer once attracted extensive audiences in all the major Eastern cities, with matches of the big local clubs often front-page news. Regular tours by European clubs were also a reliable crowd-pleaser – the recent barnstorming tours of Manchester United, Real Madrid et al are hardly a new phenomenon. In the 1930s the American Soccer League had real success at poaching notable European players, to the extent that it began to worry European football authorities. Sadly, due to infighting and spectacular mismanagement, the league and sport in general were unable to build on those successes and soccer disappeared into a no-man’s land of ethnic enclaves in a handful of major cities.

From the life-support the sport was on in the 1950s and 1960s to the improbable success of Pele and the New York Cosmos, Wangerin skillfully traces the rise and fall of the North American Soccer League. Understandably this era is given substantial treatment in the book and is probably its finest section. He looks at the phenomenon from a number of perspectives – club owners, league management, coaches and players (both foreign and local) and does not leave out the reaction of the American public in general. Just how and why the sport managed to catch fire so quickly is still something of a mystery, but Wangerin gives some compelling background to make things seem not quite so hard to believe. Of particular interest is how the league managed to implode so rapidly and, after reading the book, I’m left with the impression that, if it had been run even slightly better, the NASL would still be going strong today. It had nothing to do with some kind of inherent “un-American” aspect of soccer.

The final sections of the book deal with several of the more unique aspects of American soccer in the modern era – indoor soccer (basically a football/hockey hybrid), women’s soccer, the 1994 World Cup and the gradual (and sometimes still shaky) growth of Major League Soccer and the US national team. Despite the many ups and downs of the sport and its continued 2nd-class status in the American sports consciousness, Wangerin rightly recognizes that soccer in the States has never been stronger.

Wangerin shows attention to detail and scope of understanding that, as a long-time observer of the game in the States, I can tell you are not easy to come by. The book is full of insight into both American sports in general and the specific quirks of the sport of soccer in the US, and yet packed with endless details to back up the general story. An all-around pleasure to read.

Soccer in a Football World: The Story of America's Forgotten Game
By David Wangerin
352 pages
WSC Books Ltd, 2006
Temple University Press, 2008