Ever since I moved to San Diego in 2007, I have heard rumors of the existence of an African
Soccer League. My attempts to find it had proven unsuccessful until recently when I found a "Somali
mall," chatted up the guys who run a barbershop there, and had them put me in touch with their
friend who runs one of the teams.
In 2008, I featured a piece on siblings Alexis and Amber Hernandez. Mexican-Americans who have
grown up in the Central Valley of California, they had at the time both recently been called up to
play for Mexico's U-17s. Today, I return to this story by focusing on the club which helped them to
develop.
Two encounters with foreign fans inspired Los Angeles-based filmmaker Pablo Miralles's current
project, the documentary film about the US-Mexico soccer rivalry called Gringos at the Gate. The
first came at the 2006 World Cup in Germany, where he was on assignment for Los Angeles television
stations.
River Plate's young midfielder Diego Buanotte is currently in the hospital, recovering from
injuries he suffered in a car accident in which he was involved on December 26. Buanotte was lucky;
three friends traveling with him in the car were killed. Buanotte's father told the media that, in
addition to fearing for his son's physical health, he worries that about psychological trauma that
young Diego will likely face.
When England recently announced the potential host cities that will host games if that country
is awarded the 2018 World Cup, one stood out: Milton Keynes. The MK Stadium that would host games
is home to MK Dons, among the most controversial teams in England. MK Dons are controversial, of
course, because they are the first "franchise" club in that country.
What is American soccer culture? Ask that question to 100 people and you may very well receive
100 different responses. People's perception of American soccer culture depends entirely on where
they are coming from. Soccer moms, for instance, have very different perceptions of soccer culture
in this country than do immigrants recently arrived here.
A lot happened in the time I was gone, including the rise of Twitter. In an effort to keep up
with the times, I have established a Culture of Soccer twitter account. I think I'll mostly use it
to post articles of interest to me, but am open to suggestions about how to use this new-fangled
tool. Hope you enjoy!
I did a piece for Tom Dunmore's excellent blog Pitch Invasion today about how I became the
obsessed soccer fan that I am. Kudos to anyone who can name a player for the Dayton Dynamo!
Any list of soccer meccas in the United States would have to include Nevada Smith's. The bar,
located on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, has bringing in the soccer faithful of New York since
1994. Today, on any given weekend day, the bar shows games from morning till night.
When I travel abroad, people often tell me that the United States is good at soccer only because
they import foreigners to play for the national team. While this strategy was key in our
development as a soccer nation, it is far, far less common today. The 1990s saw the US scour
European leagues for players with American connections, coming up with gems such as Ernie Stewart
and Thomas Dooley (both of whom had American servicemen fathers) and duds such as David Wagner and
David Regis (the latter was a Frenchman whose late call-up into the 1998 World Cup squad led to
great friction within the team and was a large part of the team's horrible showing in that
tournament).
First of all, I want to apologize for the sudden disappearance of Culture of Soccer last year.
Starting graduate school ate up most of my time, and I couldn't keep up the site. However, now that
I am a couple of years into my PhD, I find myself with a bit more time and I am happy to announce
that I will be restarting Culture of Soccer shortly.
It is an understatement to say that the path from Uganda to South Carolina is not well trodden. But
in the past few years an increasing number of young men from Uganda have been making the unlikely
journey to Winthrop University in Rock Hill, South Carolina to study and play for school's soccer
team.
The only thing more incredible than the fact that brother and sister Alexis and Amber Hernandez
both play for youth national teams is the fact that both represent Mexico. The Hernandez siblings
have lived their entire lives in California, but in the past year both have worn Mexico's famous
tricolor. Children of a Mexican-born mother [.
