July 6, 2010
MY TWO CENTS
The U.S. soccer structure must change for the National Team to be successful

Long-time soccer player and fan Sal Leanti writes this e-mail in response to Gino Rullo's My Two Cents.

By Sal Leanti
Special to BigAppleSoccer.com Editor

Gino,

The soccer system in this country is so ridiculous and until that changes we will never be able to compete internationally.

Right now we are counting on our overseas players when it comes to our National Team.

Most 17-year-old high kids do not have an opportunity to go overseas. It’s impossible for most players to get recognized.

So what happens is they take their college scholarship, go off to some school where soccer means nothing, play their three months of soccer season, and then booze and party for the rest of the college year.

They do this for four seasons and by the time they graduate at age 22, they are garbage. This is the story of just about every American soccer player who has potential when they finish high school. The college game destroys them for four years.

Until this entire structure somehow changes, We will never be able to compete.

Makes no difference if we make the second round or the quarterfinals. We aren't any good. We don't play nice soccer.

England controlled the game against us, Slovenia exposed our awful defense and a terrible Algeria team could have easily beaten us. We are still way behind.


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