This world cup had been a dissapointing finish for US soccer team. They end up finishing bottom of the group E. Compare to the 2002 world cup team this team didnot do good at all. US team definately looked flat.Team was balance in a sense, however they lack solid player who could make a difference in the game. Landon Donavan, Claudio Reyna,DaMarcus Beasley,eddi Pope, and Oguchi Onyewu did not perform in top form. Landon who sccored 2 goals in last world cup was no show this time. It was disspointing day for US soccer.
US soccer definately has to do lots of work on a grass root level. Soccer is not the main sport in US and not whole lot people care about it. It is time for US to re-think how to go about developing US soccer player, specially the youth pogram. Just a highschool and college soccer program will not do the job for US in world cup level. They defintely need youth soccer school as in England, Netherland and Germany, which supply players to their A league teams.
Having said that there is always a next time. Hope US team learn from their experience and come strong next time.

Local high school soccer coach

YES. It was a sad day for US soccer team. Good luck to them for the coming years.

In coming couple of world cups .If this pace remains in USA .I am sure they are going to be holding Cup .Unlike other team who have been playing for a century and still cannot qualify.
US has shown lot of progress eventhough the americans are not passionate about it.But they are improving very fast.
Sad day for US team but the best deserves to win.

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Sad for who ? Less than 20 percent of Americans know that USA was playing in the World Cup. The degree of sadness very insignificant for whole as a nation. Most of the Amercans don't care it.

Yea Americans dont care about the soccer, Those who do will be healed once the super bowl season begins. Once the coconut shaped thing that they call football starts flying they will forget about rest of the world.

my colleagues (american) were talking with each other about NBA and were chilling out. i intruded and conveyed the SAD news.

all i got in response was : "OH REALLY!" , then they continued their discussion on NBA.


Loote

hey whya are you trying to shy away. even it is a less than 20% that is about 50 million . That is more than almost each european country playing in world cup. Look at the australia. Football isnt the most popular game there.They are selected after 36 years. Now they are in the second round.

I hope US sticks to american football. They are world champions in that .

and of course australia with a population of 18 million. A country where there are 10 times more sheep than human.

The main thing US has to do to get started in competative football is to call the sports what it is supposed to be. As long as they make fun of the sports calling it "Ladys' game," they will never progress.
It was not a sad day, not at all. For me it was a happy day.
It will be a sad day when US team actually wins the world cup. They are so full of themselves, so arrogant that if they win, they and their media will probably rant about it more years and years even when the rest of the world would have moved on.
They have no passion or respect for football. So a big NO to US.

I cannot imagine football being popular in US. It will be turned upside down. It will be like Super Bowl, where people are more interested in the show and commercial than the actual sport. They will have cheerleadrs, Mascots, Play Offs, and may be more than 0 players in each side. It will be a shame for football.

I mean to say, "May be more than 50 players on each side."

And Americans want timeout in every 5 minutes in football just like they do in American FOOTBALL which is played by hand.

One thing I hate about the Americans who are particularly bashing the USA team in the current World Cup is, they don't care about Soccer 3 yrs 11 months.....and all of a sudden, when the World Cup starts, their expectations sky-rockets...and act like they should win the World Cup....Fact of the matter is, the best breed of athletes in the USA do not go into Soccer....as Basketball, Football (American), Baseball and NHL is more lucrative...has more name and fame in the US media....Otherwise, a country with 350 + million population, 5 times as big as Germany should/could produce some better soccer players...its just that it is the 5th or 6th major sports in the USA...and hardly anyone gives a damn !

US is very capitalist when it comes down to anything.Therefore ,there is less money making in soccer, even from promoting point of view.Where as FOOTBALL and basketball they make lot of money.If they start seeing money in soccer they will be producing top class soccer players.But it is indeed sad people do not really have any passion.

One thing i would like to correct you guys on is :People is america as whole are not really passionate on any game .You may say footbal but that is not true how many people actually see football everyday or has so much passion.i am talking about normal american.They are busy with thier own life .Some have little interest in baseball some have in basketball.So american as whole is divided in sports.So , soccer is not exception.It is just the american lack of interest in sports as a nation.

KnightCrawler ....You Rock! Great Points!ImI, great points too...Passion is the key in any sports! Unless the MLS starts pulling more soccer fans and will be shown in regular TV like baseball, football and basketball (instead of Fox Soccer Channel and payper view only), it will not gain any momentum.
You guys are totally right. Where there is money, there is fame, where there is fame, people (young kids) will start looking up to them and soccer stars and play good soccer stars...WTF...I am saying soccer? I meant football guys sorry...this americanized mind is speaking out of my a** again!

Rev

IMI is right. Americans only care about money. That is why the most popular basketball players decline even the opportunity to represent their country in Olympic because they do not get paid for playing ameature.
It is sad. But good for them. That way they will never be good in real football.

Here's a short excerpt from this week's Sports Illustrated. "The Sweet Songs of Soccer" by Rick Reilly. (This article is about the songs fans sing in soccer stadiums, be it for their club teams or for their country.)

... I wish America had a decent chant. Ours is lamer than Members Only jackets. All we have is that crappy old U-S-A! U-S-A! cheer. A stoned ferret could've thought of that one. It's so bad that for the last World Cup, U.S. Soccer held a contest to pick a new official U.S. stadium chant. Out of 1,000 entries, this was the winner:

Our legs shall never tire!
Our hearts will see us throught!
Goasl! Goasl! Goasl!
For the red, white and blue!

Ugh. Why beat around the bush? Here's my entry:

We are Yankees!
We are not afraid!
You beat us tonight!
Thursday, we invade!

The problem with US is that they don't have enough experience playing against European nations and south americans, such as, brazil and argentina. Most of the countries that US has to face in World Cup Qualifications are pretty weak ones. Also, the US expects a lot because of it ridiculously over-rated FIFA ranking. I think they didn't deserve to go to the next round and the result was fair. They might wanna play more games with good countries instead of just boasting about their artificial ranking to everyone.