Some Thoughts on the US Open Cup Tie

Prost Amerika Gets Intimate with the Crowd and Thoroughly Enjoys the Experience

July 8

There are many things not to love about Starfire Center. It takes us longer to park there than it takes us to get to Qwest Field would be the main one. The other one would initially seem to be that due to limited space in the press box, some of the less favoured journalists get flung outside to a table set up to accommodate the overflow. Well, actually just us and La Raza. See a pattern there? (Don’t worry Adrian, no lawsuit planned at present!) Luckily La Raza’s Jorge Rivera is great to work besides, hugely knowledgeable about the game, has a sense of humour and adds to my knowledge by educating me on the South and Central Americans on the pitch.

But the pleasure of observing and reporting the game with Jorge isn’t the sole joy of being outside. Nor is the nice warm sun that glares onto my monitor in the first half, causing me to adopt the funniest angles. No, the other pleasure is you, the fans. You gather beside us, behind us, sometimes in front of us (please don’t do that), and if a chair is free, next to us. And, without speaking for Jorge, I love it.

Opinions are flying all around us, people use our presence to try and find out why Ljungberg’s not playing, we debate, we agree and we make friends. I get regular harassment from the female members of the Emerald City Supporters Club. (I have already waived all legal rights in this matter, and have written a terse letter to them demanding it continue.) Loyal readers drop by to say hello. Most of all I get a pleasant reminder of why I do this and who I do it for.

Tyson Wahl Makes Me Look Like I Know about Football

Last night for example, there was a nice young couple standing behind us. The gentleman was trying to educate his companion on the finer points of the game. Most of all, he was trying to convince her why, in his opinion, Tyson Wahl wasn’t very good at football. Now Tyson wasn’t having a bad game for the first half hour, so eventually I decided to stick up for the left back. I turned round and, having initially asked him if he was ‘gingerist,’ entered the debate about the different roles Tyson and Zach Scott perform at left full back, pointing out the things that Tyson brings to the team, as well as those that Zach does. We had a lively and amicable discussion, and I enjoyed the chat. Best of all, from thereon in, Tyson could do no wrong on the pitch. He was everywhere, tackling, marking, blocking, and attacking.

Eventually my desire to see if events had changed the gentleman’s mind overcame me; so around the hour mark, I asked him if he was convinced. With a huge broad but rueful smile, he said “Can’t he just f*** up once for me?” Well Tyson didn’t oblige and saw the game out without calamity, Sounders kept a clean sheet which is always goal number one for a defender, and Kasey barely had a regulation save to make, never mind a spectacular one.

In the end, the highlight of the night wasn’t anything I wrote. It was a cross between some new friends I made last week on the Gorilla FC bus to Portland stopping by, and the superb photograph my cameraman got of referee Okulaja awarding the penalty; a picture even admired by the USSF referee’s assessor. In one snap, he encapsulated the whole story of the night. No wonder, we put it above, not inside the match report.

We’ll doubtless be back outside on July 21st when Houston come to visit. I hope the Texans bring their weather with them. If they do, can one of you stand behind us for the first half so the sun isn’t landing on my monitor? Jorge and I would be very agradecido. That’s a word. I looked it up.

After the match, I spoke to Tyson Wahl. Tyson is a very humble down to earth guy. Often he appears like he doesn’t quite fathom why you would care about his opinion. “I thought I was average,” he said modestly. Last time I stick up for him!