Every rare and fleeting home game for Canada’s national men’s soccer team is a snapshot of where we stand.

Saturday’s 0-2 loss to young, rebuilding Peru was a disappointment on the field, with the attacking trio of Dwayne de Rosario, Rob Friend and Simeon Jackson producing zero dangerous combination moves.

So I want to put some attention onto the other ongoing story at BMO Field that night – the stands.

Empty seats, alas, were the dominant life form on the night.  The north and upper-west stands were completely empty, and what remained was no better than half full.  Attendance was announced at 10,000, but was two-thirds of that – tops.

Of that number, Peruvians outnumbered Canadians.  But the Canadian support section, behind the south goal, sang, stomped and thundered all night long – not even slightly subsiding when a brief and heavy rainfall soaked and scattered the Peru people just before halftime.

Typical BMO Field weather, by the way!  Wind, cold, and rain, followed by hot, gleaming sunshine.

I don’t much feel like declaring a disaster here.  It’s the down-point in the international soccer cycle, and Friday of the Labour Day weekend is probably the lowest-population day in Toronto’s entire calendar.

But I do have what I hope will be a helpful suggestion for how those acres of empty seats should have been filled.

The minute we know we’re only selling half the tickets – and that wasn’t exactly a secret – here’s what the Canadian Soccer Association ought to do:

Get on the horn to every youth soccer club in the GTA, and offer the empty seats to groups of young players – at five bucks a pop.

I stood high atop the west grandstand, looking down at thousands of empty seats, with a tight smattering of Peruvians below.  That view would have been improved greatly by dozens of busloads of youngsters from Oakville, Glen Shields, North Scarborough, Pickering, Woodbridge, Newmarket, Ajax – any and everywhere the beautiful game is played in and around Toronto.

This, by the way, is exactly how the Montreal Impact jammed the Olympic Stadium for the Santos Laguna CONCACAF match two seasons ago.  Sell as many as you can, and deal everything else cheap to the kids.

Right away, the energy level gets cranked up, along with the volume of pro-Canada cheering.  The kids get to see their national team play, and who knows who gets inspired to do what after that? 

Saturday was the first time Canada has played on real grass at BMO, and that’s a big step forward.  But the attendance problem has to be addressed. 

The actual number of Canada fans in the park was almost certainly below 3,000.  (Call me a liar all you want, John.  I took the time to count the Peruvians and empty seats.)

These aren’t the dark days of the “Sack the CSA” black shirt protest of 2007.  Many things have changed since then, largely for the better.  But that’s a dismal number of fans showing up to support Canada – worse, I would argue, than the Canada-Honduras night of horror in Montreal two years ago.

As long as such things are possible, sailing half the tickets to the clubs simply has to happen.  Tomorrow’s fans and players get a cheap, exciting treat, thousands more seats get filled, and the CSA actually makes a bit more cash on the deal.

Given how little was actually on the line, it wouldn’t be fair dismiss the Peru match as a step backward.  But we sure didn’t go forward on the night – and here comes Honduras-in-Montreal II on Tuesday night.

So – where were you on Saturday?

Onward!

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In the wake of Toronto FC’s disturbing, dispiriting 0-1 loss away to Arabe Unido of Panama on Tuesday night, great scorn has been heaped on TFC coach Preki for his odd and indifferent lineup decisions.

A third-string goalie here, a banged-up defender who hadn’t played in many weeks there, no DeRo for the first half, no Mista at all, subbing in Gargan and Nane late when the Reds really needed a goal.  On and on, etcetera, so there.

As much as TFC’s rabid fans are outraged, there are some deep, serious realities Preki had to address. 

I’m not talking about the ongoing tabloid hype about Preki and Mista not getting along.  I’m not even buying that one until it starts coming at me from multiple directions.  Rather, those lineup choices may have had far more to do with Toronto’s gruesome Saturday loss to Thierry Henry and the PopCans – and the present dreadful state of the CONCACAF Champions League.

In order of how they occurred:

The loss to New York, coupled with San Jose’s 1-0 win over the Less Astonishing Galaxy two hours later, dumped Toronto out the MLS top eight.  Sure, the Reds basically have ten games left to gain a game on Colorado, and that has to be doable.  But they also have to hold off an improving Chicago side, and both Kansas City and Houston are edging back into the picture, as well.

Those prospects become a bit more worrying when you look at Toronto’s next three matches:

- Home to the Salt Lake Seagulls on Saturday.  The defending champs, bless them, playing well, with a speedy, creative, multi-waved attack, and Nick Garcia starting at centre back thanks to Nana Attakora’s hand-ball red card against New York.  

- Away to Dallas a week later.  We all love to dismiss and make fun of FC Bouncy Castle, but the simple truth is they have more points than New York – and a game in hand.

- Away to Chicago on September 8.  Sure, the Reds roughed them up 4-1 at BMO back in May, but the Fire are improving – now just two points back of Toronto, with two games in hand.

Oh, and both the Dallas and Chicago games coincide – exactly, or within a day – with Canada’s home matches against Peru and Honduras.  So, forget about TFC having all their players for either match.

Looking at this, Preki would be well within his rights to hold players back, and throw everything he possibly can at the Salt Lake game.  That doesn’t really explain sitting backup goalie John Conway in Panama, but now we’re quibbling.

The loss in Panama seems, on the surface, to be a colossal missed opportunity.  But that ignores some chronic, ugly facts.

The CONCACAF Champions League, in its present form, is far loftier as an idea than a real competition. 

So, it’s great that Toronto beat a half-speed Cruz Azul a week ago, but we’re all incensed that they stayed in neutral and protected their roster in a loss to Arabe Unido?  Is that the same Panama game that was marred by one-sided officiating, dirty play and endless play-acting by the Central Americans?

Right now, with roster restrictions, tight salary cap, brutal fixture backlog and the ongoing laff-a-minit funfest that is being a Canadian or American visiting team south of El Paso, Texas, the CCL is badly flawed.  Yes, it gave us a Canadian championship tournament, and that’s been great.  Yes, it’s wonderful to welcome new and exotic teams up to BMO and play opponents who feel a lot realer than San Jose and Chivas USA.

But CONCACAF is a tough, enraging sideshow for MLS sides.  Especially when you consider – the alternative.

Making the playoffs in MLS is far, far more important, folks.  If Toronto gets to the post-season, the matches are pretty much coin flips from there.  As Salt Lake proved a year ago, a team that is dead and buried with one week to go in the regular season can actually win the freaking championship!

And this year, that championship game is being played – in Toronto.

Success in CONCACAF is exciting, seductive and great for the ego.  It’s also an illusory add-on that puts terrible stress on MLS rosters, and leads to farcical matches like the Panama trip.  Toronto was battered and disrespected – by the refs, the Panamanians and heavy time and personnel restrictions inflicted on them by their own league!

As much as I would have loved to see Toronto beat the United Arabs of Panama (who were neither Arab, nor particularly united), I find myself unable to muster much anger at Preki for sending out a vastly undermanned side. 

The Salt Lake game is simply too important.  The Dallas and Chicago trips look dire, and losing three in a row would all but kill Toronto now.

When CONCACAF and MLS can work out a better way to schedule Champions League games, when there are actually enough players on the roster to do the extra matches justice, and should the experience of being a Canadian team in Central America ever become less of a dangerous, insulting farce, then maybe we can gas-can Preki for resting his troops.

A week ago, I asked you which you would prefer to focus on: the CCL or the playoff race.  On Tuesday night in Panama, I humbly submit the Champions League made that choice for us.

Onward!

So, let’s focus on those two lovely goals Toronto FC scored in the first half Tuesday night, whilst knocking off Cruz Azul of Mexico in the opening match of group play in the CONCACAF Champions League.

Third minute – right off the top! – and a long, high ball looks certain to go out of bounds over the Cruz Azul end line.  It gets run down (and cannily controlled) by TFC fullback (!!) Maxim Usanov. 

He knocks it goalward down the line to Dwayne de Rosario, who has no shot.  So he plays it goalward down the line to Mista, who has no shot.  He pops it head-high across the goalmouth, where a late-breaking Martin Saric forces the goalie to commit left, and heads it beautifully into the gaping right side of the goal.

This play was over, folks.  If you’re waiting for your fullback to corral a stray loop-job off the opposing end line, you might as well just drop back and brace for the goal kick.  But Usanov is a creative little cuss, and he has a lot of imagination to complement a pretty decent first touch on the ball.  And any of DeRo, Mista or Saric could have dropped the pursuit – but they didn’t. 

The fullback grabs a low-percentage ball snag, and three different teammates join him in creating a way for the ball to go into the enemy net.  That ain’t the Toronto FC I’ve been accustomed to seeing.

44^th minute – Backup fullback Raivis Hscanovics lays a lovely square ball into the path of Mista, who rips one low and right.  The ‘keeper guesses right and gets hand to it, but the ball has just enough to squirt out and just … barely … roll … over … the … goal … line.

A fine play, and some pure, beautiful finish.  Mista had already shown in his brief time with Toronto that he can take on defenders and pass beautifully.  Now we get to see a worthy striker’s finish – one that ultimately sealed the contest.  Again, this is a higher order of play than we’ve been seeing.

Okay, Cruz Azul really wasn’t all that interested.  The two-time cup finalists know when to turn it on in group play, and away to Toronto on opening night apparently wasn’t it.  Up and down the field, all throughout the night, Our Reds had more time on the ball than usual. 

The wonderful news, though, is that they consistently made good decisions. 

It must be admitted that back-up goalie John Conway – getting his first first-team action of the calendar year – bailed them out a couple of times.  But you know what?  Good!  Back-up goalies can become starters in a heartbeat.  I want ours to feel confident should the doom bell ring for starter Stefan Frei.

Toronto FC is, by no means, facing any kind of clear sailing in CONCACAF.  They took full advantage of a golden chance, but that’s not the same thing as clinching anything.  It’s also true that they’re still tied with San Jose for the final playoff spot, while the Earthquakes have a game in hand and don’t have to play a half dozen extra Champions League matches before the MLS regular season winds down.

Should TFC not get full points from this Saturdays home tiff against Jersey Joy Juice, fixture backlog and a rising injury list may force coach Preki to tighten his focus on either MLS or CONCACAF, and decide to let the other go.

Or – this team will simply dig down, and find a way to keep both campaigns going, against all odds and mathematical logic. 

Either way, these are thrilling times at BMO Field.  The games are grittier, and mean more.  The team is clearly improving, and supporter enthusiasm in the grandstands is boiling up nicely.

How ‘bout it, fans?  If TFC is forced to choose between pushing for the playoffs and trying to advance in the CCC – which would you choose?

Onward!

Been a while since we did this. 

The ninth in an ongoing series, chronicling the muddle-mouthed misadventures of FIFA president Sepp Blatter, in the alluring, seductive presence of an open microphone.

Last week, Ol’ Blatty got caught in the open musing about how lovely it would be if group games in the next World Cup weren’t allowed to end in draws.  Force a winner, one way or t’other, and wouldn’t that be luverly?

Sure – if you like bad soccer and cheap, unearned results.

I want to start by defending the humble, unloved draw.  Soccer is the one sport left out there (chess? really?) that considers all-even at fulltime to be a good and honourable result.  And so it is. 

New Zealand did not defeat Italy at the recent World Cup in South Africa.  But they did draw them, and that was enough to implode Italy’s cup defence, gleefully granting the South Seas a bit of revenge for the deplorably unethical way the Italians put paid to Australia in the round of 16 four years ago.

Draws perform two vital functions in the group stage of a World Cup.  They create a wide variety of different standings situations across the eight preliminary groups, and they keep the first 48 games to two hours each.

Eliminate them, and all the groups would become eerily similar.  And, you would regularly start to see two recurring nightmare situations:

- If one team in the group wins all their games and the other three teams split, a team with three points moves on to round two.

- If one team in the group loses all their games and the other three teams split, a team with six points gets eliminated.

A single draw destroys both these unhappy possibilities.  (Yes, draws also create the possibility of a team moving on with just two points, but it’s highly unlikely, and has never yet happened so far as I can tell.)

Also. A huge part of the allure of the World Cup is that you can – if your endurance and appetite are up to it – watch all the games.  A sudden, random smattering of three-hour group games would make that all-but-impossible.  Yes, you might get more upsets by allowing penalty-kick shootouts, but they would be of the cheaper, more dubious variety – and who needs more of that at the world’s greatest single-sport event?

There’s also a deeper, less flattering reason to shun extra time as much as possible.  This doesn’t get discussed a lot, but it’s quite howlingly obvious:

- Extra-time soccer sucks.

Not always, certainly.  But it’s an extra, forced half-hour, being played by exhausted players.  This isn’t hockey, where the game can end at any moment.  It isn’t basketball or baseball, where the overtime is parceled into short, measured segments. 

Soccer takes you from stoppage time in the second half – where any drawn game can be settled in a heartbeat – to a grim, breathless half-speed dance where, quite often, both sides are content to put it in park and let luck fall where it may in penalty kicks.

In my last decade of watching soccer, I don’t recall a single time I didn’t feel disappointed when a game went into extra time.  It’s a lousy deal for the players, fans, and – should the game go to penalty kicks – the sport of soccer in general.

Sepp, do you really want to trash your television schedule, water down your game, court disaster in the group-stage standings and double or triple the number of cheap, unearned upsets?

Why not preserve the simple elegance of two-hour games, with vastly different dramas evolving over and throughout the different groups?  You already have no draws in the final 16 matches.  That marks a fine dramatic turning point in each World Cup, when it comes.  You go from regular season to playoffs, and extra time suddenly seems appropriate – necessary, even, because there is no room at all in a WC schedule for replays.

I am continually amazed – and disheartened – by the way Sepp Blatter’s mind does or doesn’t work.  If he had his way, we’d be down to ten players a side, there would be penalty boxes, and fewer teams in every league so there wouldn’t be fixture backlog so that players wouldn’t drop dead of heart attacks at his totally unnecessary Confederations Cup (even that that isn’t – and never, ever was – why Marc-Vivien Foe died).

I see soccer’s place in the world, and how well and wonderfully this simple, lovely game is doing.  I can’t help wondering how much better it all would be … if Joseph Sepp Blatter had never been born.

Onward!

One of the truly wonderful things about watching the same soccer team week in, week out, is charting the ongoing development of talented young players.

Let’s say a good player lasts a decade in the pros.  That’s four or five years of continuous development off the start of a career.  Break that down into quarter or half seasons, and you’ll easily discover that rising stars are not the same player month-by-month.

Such is very much the case right now with Toronto FC goaltender Stefan Frei.

The 24-year-old Swiss, now in his second full season with the Reds, is playing with renewed confidence, and knocking down some very pleasing results.  In TFC’s past two matches – away to Motagua of Honduras and home to Chivas USA – Frei has cemented good results, especially with some tremendous work in the air.

Frei is making diving saves look routine.  He’s been particularly fearsome flying to his left. 

Against Chivas on Saturday, he finger-tipped a particularly deadly chance just past his left post, and then got astonishing air and extension to smother another dangerous scoring bid right at the match’s end.

That final save was a thing of absolute beauty.  He knew it was coming, saw it all the way, and soared like Superman to haul it in.  To cover that much distance off your feet doesn’t just take talent.  It requires … confidence.

It helps, of course, that Toronto FC’s long-maligned back four is actually stabilizing things out there.  With the young Canadian pairing of Nana Attakora and Adrian Cann working the middle, there’s been a significant drop in the number of miscues, muffs and fatal back-passes Frei has been tormented by.

With faith in the four, Frei can hang back and watch the play develop.  If his defenders know he likes the ball up and to his left, steps can be taken to ensure that’s where the next shot is going. 

The beauty of Frei’s aerial work isn’t just that he’s getting to the ball.  He’s smothering it.  Excellent hands are holding the ball consistently – and if it takes an abnormally long and well-timed leap to make that possible, Frei is offering that, as well.

This – beyond doubt – is a better goaltender than the one who started the season.  That guy was nervous, off-balance, and trying to do way too much.  And, in his defence, he pretty much had to.  But now, with a clearer, more solid picture in front of him, this ever-improving backstop can bide his time, see the play shape up, read the shot before it’s taken, and get to wherever he needs to fly.

It’s wonderful to watch, too. 

In the locker room, he’s humble, and gives full credit to his teammates.  He likes winning, is saving wins, and delighted to be part of an improving team.

How long will all this last?  Frei seems certain to be called home to Europe in the not-too-distant future if he really means what he’s been doing the past couple of weeks.  In the meantime, though, he’s hot, motivated and right on top of his game.  He’s always learning and listening, as well.

Frei’s recent brilliance is not a fluke.  And his emergence – now – is exactly what this still-unproven Toronto team needs, with both a tight playoff race and a grinding CONCACAF Champions League campaign ahead.

Onward!

When it was almost over – when Toronto FC’s shaky passage to the group stages proper of the CONCACAF Champions League was all but assured – Red Patch Boys president Boris Roberto Aguilar locked eyes with me across a bar table and an empty pitcher of beer.

“I don’t think my heart can take six more games of this!” he gasped.

Boris is a charming soul: a big guy with a broad and easy smile.  He spent the evening at Red Patch Central – the Shoeless Joe’s next to Lamport Stadium in Toronto’s brick-and-shadow west-end warehouse row.  He was surrounded by friends, and full of chicken wings. 

And he had endured a night of agony.

May the record show, Your Honour, that the Torontos did, in fact, seal the deal and win the day.  A 2-2 draw away to Motagua of Hated Honduras, more than enough to send them on to face Cruz Azul of Mexico, Aribe Unido of Panama, and defending champions of Major League Soccer, your ever-lovin’ Salt Lake Seagulls.

TFC earned it, in the sense that they were ahead when it was over.  But this humid, hammering night in Honduras is a game they could – SHOULD – have lost decisively. 

Further to the point, Your Honour, it is submitted that any and everyone who likes, loves or lurches along with Our Reds owes goalie Stefan Frei conspicuous beer this day.  Without a steady, composed, athletic display from Switzerland’s 2018 World Cup goaltender, Motagua would have mangled these misfooted maple leaf MLSers into mulch.

The Red Patch experience, for the two jangling hours it took Toronto to not lose, consisted of endless, gnashing, fiercely worded anguish and frustration – punctuated only by two jubilant, leaping, exultant, full-voiced goal celebrations.

Goals = good.  Effort = kinda adequate.  Actual soccer on the pitch = very bad.

Okay – second game of a road trip, sweltering humidity, five-hour bus trip, no time to train.  Welcome to CONCACAF.  There’s no point using any of that for excuses, because we all learned ages ago that the only actual crime down there is to be surprised.

Of course TFC defender Dan Gargan got yellow carded on a nothing play.  The guy had blatantly been wearing a Toronto jersey from the moment he left the tunnel!  What did anyone expect?  (Granted, it wasn’t that bad on the night.  But there have been other nights, haven’t there?)

After getting ripped for an early goal – former TFCer Amado Guevara on a low, gorgeous bullet header just six minutes in – TFC settled into a wholly one-dimensional game plan.  Get-ball, then-run-real-fast-down-the-middle.  No width, no looking for open wing men.  Just GO!!!

Yes, it produced nifty goals from Dwayne de Rosario and Chad Barrett, but it also conceded far too much of the ball to the Motaguans.  A second goal from Guevara – highlight-reel slotbomb volley – offered a late scare, but couldn’t close the gap.

It’s an odd feeling when a hundred people in a bar in Toronto see TFC midman Nick LaBrocca open on the right side, but a ball-hustling DeRo doesn’t.  Yes, stuff like that happens in every soccer match.  It just doesn’t usually look like the game plan.

Most disappointing of all, I thought, was designated player Julian de Guzman.  There are two parts of his game – positioning and ball movement.  Positioning is hard to read off a lower-than-low-rez Caribbean TV feed, so I concentrated on ball movement.  Every time de Guzman touched the ball, I assessed where it ended up.  I didn’t hear myself say “good ball” until Julian lasered a defence-shredding running pass to DeRo – well into the second half. 

Certainly, Julian had some defensive touches that weren’t awful, but his touch all-but-completely deserted him going forward.

With no wing play, and only counterbreaks to count on, Toronto FC forced itself to play a non-possession, flat-out reaction game – not exactly perfect in high-altitude, blast-furnace heat, or wise for a side that was actually ahead on aggregate entering the game.

The win counts, though, and three more home games will now be added to the BMO Field dance card. 

And it’s perfectly in character with the odd, odd season Preki’s troops are having.  This is a team that just had an eleven-game undefeated string (all competitions) in which they scored only eleven goals.  And four of those were scored in the streak’s opening match, that ringing 4-1 home win over Chicago back on May 8.

Yes, they’re getting results.  But are they any good?

The troubling thought I’m left with is that TFC caught Motagua in training camp, far from their best form.  The CCL teams they face now won’t be that rusty.  MLS teams, in general, get clobbered in the Champions League from here on in. 

But – and this was the deeper point of those delirious Red Patch goal celebrations – this is the first time Toronto has qualified for the competition’s group stages, and that is certainly cause for joy amongst the fandom. 

But Boris wasn’t the only one whose heart had a long night.  It will be intriguing – and likely re-agonizing – to see how things progress from here.

Onward!

Hey, folks.

I’m taking a short break to deal with a flurry of work and life matters.

All is well.  I’ll be back in a week or two.

Onward!

As much as I despise cheating, the Luis Suarez last-second handball that saved Uruguay’s World Cup bacon against Ghana is a leopard of a very different spot.

It was a moment of absolute blind panic – both ways. Ghana were desperate to cash in a goal, and avoid the nightmare of penalty kicks in their hugely dramatic bid to be the first African nation ever to qualify for the World Cup’s final four. Uruguay were in defensive tatters, their goalie out of the play, the ball rocketing for the back of their net.

In war, this is an instantaneous, fatal decision. By reaching out his arm to block the ball, Suarez essentially threw his body over a hand grenade to give his platoon mates a chance to live through the night. He was instantly red-carded – and suspended, and his teammates still had to stand around and watch the imminent nightmare of Asamoah Gyan’s penalty kick.

Nothing instantaneous about this. Masses of people who were actually watching the game missed Suarez’s suicidal second. Glanced away, looking for the popcorn, opening a beer, letting your best friend in the door because he picked that fated moment to arrive (that’s what happened to me, at least).

But there’s no such mercy on a penalty kick at 120 minutes of extra time. Last kick of the game. Striker should connect at along about a ninety-per-cent kill rate. Everyone rushes to the screen to see it. The viewing audience grows hugely in the minute or so it takes to sort out the pre-kick niceties. What do you bet two-thirds of the entire nation of Ghana was watching by the time Gyan addressed the ball?

I wonder – now – how it might possibly feel to have the entire weight of your home nation dropped on you from a great height? All Gyan had to do was burn one ball past one very small and inexperienced netminder, and the biggest soccer street party in the history of coastal West Africa would have instantaneously ignited.

The military mission was clear. Gyan had been chosen to summarily execute the impudent Suarez – and all his South American squadron mates besides. The futility of the Uruguayan target man’s sacrifice was about to be made plain. Justice – by anybody’s measure – was about to be done.

(Yes, yes, I know this all goes out the window if Ghana was as offside as a large number of still photos all over the internet suggest. That’s another metaphor for another time. Today, we field the call that was actually made.)

I have written, more than occasionally, that penalty kicks are psychologically sadistic. Not for the goalies. They know damn well they’re supposed to lose. The only thing that can statistically go wrong on a spot kick is if the ball stays out of the net. And that’s so rare – on any normal day in any normal park – it doesn’t bear thinking about.

Ah, but Gyan was thinking about it. It was burning in his desperate eyes. All that endless time that passes as the call is made and Suarez is red-carded and the ball is put on the spot and Suarez slowly wanders to the sideline and everyone in Ghana who is watching the game shouts, screams, urges and summons everyone in Ghana who isn’t watching the game to hurry hurry right this minute get over here and watch this game!!!

For all of that emotional eternity, Asamoah Gyan stood alone.

It’s not a time you want to think. Not helpful to know what’s at stake – and certainly corrosive to the cranium to even slightly ponder at the aching implications … of a miss. Kill that thought. Banish it. But now you think about NOT thinking about missing.

And the problem is so simple. Get that ball away from the goalie, and safely into the net. He’s not even a big goalie. Just under the bar should do it. Just under … just under … maybe just a titch more lift to be certain ….

And just like that, Asamoah Gyan hits the crossbar. Uruguay is alive through deception, but have survived their penalty, and the rules are clear.

For now, it really doesn’t matter that Ghana lost the subsequent shootout, and that two quite different Ghanaians other than Gyan missed their shots, and that’s why Ghana really lost. History will never remember that.

One man had one almost-certain shot to lift his nation higher than anyone on their entire continent had ever climbed. And the shot – with no interference whatsoever from the opposing goalie – never made it to the net.

How do you live with something like that? How will that ever, ever go away? All of Gyan’s inspired, often brilliant play, the lifetime of physical punishment it took to even bet there in the first place, the certain knowledge that nine times out of ten he becomes his country’s Paul Henderson if that cursed ball had settled in the twine.

Too much, folks. Too much.

Things like this happen in war. My grandfather met my grandmother when he returned from World War I with the news that her fiancée had been killed in action – after the armistice was signed. If that pointless, extra-time tragedy doesn’t happen, I’m not here to tell this tale.

If Suarez doesn’t cheat, Gyan never gets a chance to be the hero. Nor does he get to be the scapegoat.

As a wrenching piece of human drama, the whole damn couple of minutes were astonishing. But this was war, and there were casualties.

My hatred of cheating is reserved for those who were neither caught, nor punished. You know who you are, Diego, and I thoroughly enjoyed what happened to you this weekend.

Suarez was caught, and punishment was swift. The bitter battlefield tragedy is that Asamoah Gyan will never be free of the memory.

Onward!

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Sometimes, something happens that just can’t happen on its own. You see it, your brain rejects it, and you leap up, point and shout “Aha!”

(Or Yoiks!, Streuth!, Hands off the creampuffs, Molly!, or the ever-popular Gotcha!)

No, I’m not talking about match-fixing. Haven’t even given that cursed subject a blessed thought since the World Cup kicked off. I’m talking about something far less likely, and infinitely more … subtle.

Let us shift the scene to a sumptuous hotel suite in some exotic city, pretty much any time in the past couple of years. The sleepy man in the Ebeneezer Scrooge nightdress is FIFA president Sepp Blatter.

The ghost appears, wearing an old, red soccer jersey with the number 10 on the back.

Blatter: Who … who goes there?

Ghost: A friend.

Blatter: I have no friends.

Ghost: No, but your level of self-awareness is higher than I thought.

Blatter: Stop right there. Don’t make me sic Jack Warner on you.

Ghost: I am a spirit, Sepp. There is nothing you can do to harm me.

Blatter: What do you want?

Ghost: To set you straight.

Blatter: You couldn’t afford it.

Ghost: Money means nothing to a ghost, Sepp. Although I fear it will to you when your time comes.

Blatter: What’s this about, anyway? If not money ….

Ghost: Instant replay.

Blatter: (Coughs, sputters, shakes head, pops eyes) Instant replay?

Ghost: Yep. It’s time.

Blatter: But the purity of the game!

Ghost: Save that wheeze for the press corps, Sepp. I know you far too well for that.

Blatter: If replay was about money, we’d have it by now. I assure you, there’s been no shortage of offers.

Ghost: I don’t care why. I’m just here to tell you what’s going to happen if you don’t let video cameras help out with goal/no goal decisions.

Blatter: You’re threatening me?

Ghost: Promising you.

Blatter: Promising … what?

Ghost: Sepp, what if I told you England and Germany are going to meet in the 2010 World Cup?

Blatter: It’s certainly possible, but no one knows for sure.

Ghost: I do.

Blatter: How?

Ghost: I just got back from the game. 4-1 to Germany – and you’re about to tell the world you’re rethinking video replay.

Blatter: Impossible! Nothing could do that!

Ghost: Do you recognize this shirt I’m wearing, Sepp?

Blatter: Red. Old. Are those three lions on the crest?

Ghost: England. 1966. Do you recognize the number on the back.

Blatter: 10. So?

Ghost: Geoff … Hurst.

Blatter: Oh, even I know that one! Scored the winning goal against Germany in extra time at Wembley. The ball came down off the crossbar, and probably didn’t go over the line. All the pro-replay fools point to that one.

Ghost: Very good.

Blatter: So what?

Ghost: It’s going to happen again. Frank Lampard for England, and this one’s going in. The ref won’t see it, the goal doesn’t count, and Germany wins 4-1.

Blatter: …

Ghost: And the whole world sees the instant replay.

Blatter: That would be … awkward.

Ghost: Awkward? Wait till you see the look on Lampard’s face! Eyes imploring, heart stopped – gotta be one of the great soccer photos of the decade.

Blatter: England-Germany, ball off the bar, blown call ….

Ghost: Again.

Blatter: You can’t.

Ghost: I did.

Blatter: But why?

Ghost: The world has changed, Sepp. People want what they can see with their eyes. Your refs have a lot of ground to cover. They can’t see everything.

Blatter: So I’ll put extra refs beside the nets.

Ghost: And one day, one of them will blow a call, and you’ll look like ….

Blatter: Don’t say it.

Ghost: Hey, just because I can see and change the future doesn’t mean I can adequately complete that sentence.

Blatter: Well, what about offside calls?

Ghost: Well, that comes up in a different game the very same day. Different issue, though, because you can’t reverse it if the flag comes up when it should have stayed down.

Blatter: We’re splitting hairs.

Ghost: Yes, but there may be hyper-pedantic witnesses to our chat – if anyone ever writes it up.

Blatter: Whoever you are, I cannot believe such a thing will ever happen. Sure, a ball will come down off a crossbar soon, and that’s always a tough call. But England, against Germany? Impossible.

Ghost: It’s already happened, Sepp. You just haven’t passed through that time yet.

Blatter: This is nonsense. I am dreaming. You are not real. Replay is out. Case closed.

Ghost: So be it, Sepp. When it happens, you will know.

Blatter: IT WILL NOT HAPPEN!!

Ghost: So, I guess there’s no point in me telling you what fate’s got lined up for Jack Warner in 2013?

Blatter: (Is it good?)

Ghost: (Could be.)

The ghost vanishes. Blatter refuses to allow replay. England and Germany are drawn in adjacent groups, and face each other in the round of 16.

Onward!

It’s insidious, it’s real – and as of noon Wednesday, Eastern daylight time, it’s entirely justified.

In the wake of the America-Algeria climax, my pal Rudi Schuller Facebooked in from South Africa his puzzlement that he’d found himself cheering for Landon Donovan … again.

I know how he feels – and the disorientation is a tricky adjustment. 

With his last-gasp winning goal that won Group C and kept Uncle Sam’s World Cup stumble dance alive, Citizen Landon Captain America Donovan has cemented his place as the uncontested outward face of Yank soccer.  It’s one of the biggest goals in the nation’s footy history, and should prove to be a huge boon to popularizing the world’s most popular game in the world’s most traditionally reluctant soccer nation.

I’m not anti-American.  I’m deeply skeptical of America, but that’s not the same thing at all.  I’ve always thought the United States was – on average – a little too heavily armed to be that globally naïve.  And Landon’s pretty-boy-we’re-number-one thing has never, ever gone down well. 

For all those years, the American hype machine told us all what a great player Landon Donovan is – honest!  And for most of those same years, we looked at his poor performances in Europe, and thought yeah, the kid can play a bit, but so hairy wot?  Toss in Landon’s role with the 2008 L.A. Galaxy, who played like desiccated dog barf for eight calendar months on the trot, and liking Donovan just wasn’t much of an option, most days.

Too cute.  Too sweet.  Too much of all the things I distrust and dislike about George Bush and Sarah Palin’s America.

But then …

- Landon does just fine at Everton, thanks. 

- Landon is a huge contributor to a brilliant, league-leading start for the oh-ten Galaxy.

- Landon neatly and professionally scores that all-world, ultra-clutch winner against Algeria.

Try this on, Landon haters:

Who cares how the kid does in Europe?  What if his true role is to be THE American soccer superstar, and play all his finest years – and best football – based in Major League Soccer?

Nothing Landon didn’t do in two tours of Germany is hurting him in any way at all as he leads the U.S. into the round of 16, and the Galaxy to a huge lead at the top of the domestic ladder.  Nothing about Landon’s smarmy cuteness matters a whit compared to the genuine, deeply human joy and pride he’s been expressing – eloquently and almost humbly – ever since the Algerians went down.

This … is … a … good … soccer … story.

A REALLY good soccer story – and there’s nothing in my Tea-Party-despising, stars-and-stripes-induced nagging, cautious Canadian concern that even matters a whit anymore.

Landon Donovan wasn’t put on this planet to be a soccer superstar in Europe.  He’s here to be the man who – finally – makes Major League Soccer matter in its own country.

That’s a significantly good trick, y’all.  And I freely and gleefully admit I’m enjoying watching Captain America do his work.

Thoughts?

Onward!