Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
I think we were not good enough.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
Was it our day? We didn't perform in the way
that we're supposed to perform, show it our quality. But
I seen all that was happening around. It was around,
but I think it wasn't a situation that affects us.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
On the group.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
That's a coach of the United States soccer team which
lost yesterday pretty badly four to one. It was disappointing,
but clearly if you watched it all, Belgium was the
better team. They were just a lot better. We scored
one goal, and I think it looks to me like
it got tipped in that free kick, and that's why
(00:42):
the goalie didn't get to it.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
So I think if it hadn't been tipped, we wouldn't
have scored any goals.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Anyway, we'd like to welcome Anthony Martinez to the Armstrong
and Getty Show today. We're gonna talk a little bit
of world copies. Our World Cup correspondent, Anthony. We have
landed on the moon six times, Belgium zero, so we
dominate them in that competition, but not so much in
the soccer.
Speaker 4 (01:02):
We got them that. We also got them in super bowls.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
So y, yes, They're not even close, man, were they?
They're just better than us?
Speaker 1 (01:09):
Right, Yeah.
Speaker 4 (01:10):
You know after the match, a lot of people kept
talking about how there's levels to this, right, yeah, and
we're clearly not there yet. We had a lot of
progress made this tournament, but last night just went to
show that US still has quite a way to go
to compete with the big boys.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:25):
It was certainly exciting though when we scored that one goal,
that was about it. So this was in Seattle, so
we basically had the home crowd advantage. That was about
as loud a crowded eruption as I've ever heard in
any sporting thing ever.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
Yeah, the atmosphere was great, right, the fans showed up. Unfortunately,
the team's performance in a match the fans performance last night. So,
but you know, the fan support has been great throughout
the tournament. I think that's been really encouraging because that's
always been one of the sticking points with the with
the US soccer is that the fan support hasn't really
been there, you know, at a large scale. Before there's
(02:01):
the diehards. Of course, you have groups like American Outlaws
that follow the team wherever they go. But you know,
in mass the square hasn't been there, but it seems
like that tide has finally turned. And so if nothing
else from the termament, at least there's that.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (02:16):
I it definitely feels different than previous World Cups, and
not just because it's in North America. The level of
attention to all the games, not just US games, is
different than I remember. Is that because at this point
every little kid has played soccer in their lives or
for for some reason.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
You know, it's that.
Speaker 4 (02:36):
And it's also I attribute a lot of the growth
of soccer to streaming because it's made the games outside
of North America more accessible. You know, people can watch
the Premier League, Serie A, any South American gimes. You
can basically watch any game that's happening on any weekend
now right there at your fingertips. And so, you know,
(02:58):
a lot of millennials and younger generation we've grown up
with being able to watch soccer, international soccer whenever we want,
and I think that's really played a big part in
the growth of the game here in the US as well.
Speaker 3 (03:13):
I don't have a rooting interest, really, but I was
kind of written for Mexico against England the other night
because they had the home crowd advantage there in Mexico
City and it was just exciting, you know, to have
the loud crowd, and I thought it'd be cool if
they went on. But England won. Who's left that's like
the favorite to win the whole thing.
Speaker 4 (03:32):
You know, Argentina plays today and it's hard to bet
against Messi, right, the greatest of all time. So I
think they're still at the top of a lot of
people so listening to make it to the final. Of course,
like you mentioned, England's still in it. Spain is looking
really really good, and you know, they have this young
(03:53):
eighteen year old budding star La Migna mal who's just
looked absolutely dynamic in the games they played so far.
They'll be played playing Belgium next on Friday in Los Angeles,
France says, look great. They look really complete as a team,
led by Killing and Bape, one of the greatest goal
scorers in history. So there's you know again, I think
(04:15):
this all comes back to you, is showing you that
there's levels to this and the Corolla's right to the top,
right and it's starting to show that right now. The tournament.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
I didn't have any dream that we were going to
win this thing or anything like that. But man, if
we could have gotten past Belgium and played Spain in
La on Friday, that would have been pretty exciting.
Speaker 4 (04:32):
Oh yeah, that would have been obviously the biggest match
in the history of US soccer. I think, you know,
it would have been at noon in La so I
think the whole country would have came to the stop. Yeah,
it probably would have been the first time ever that
that's happened for a soccer match. But yeah, that would
have been fantastic, right. But you know, hey, you know
(04:55):
there there there are rumblings that the US could be
hosting again sooner rather than later, you know, in the
next decade or so. You got twenty thirty coming up
in Morocco, Paraguay, and Portugal. Saudi Arabia will be having
the Cup in twenty thirty four, so you'll look at
maybe twenty thirty eight, the World Cup could be returning
to North America, and you know, maybe by then the
(05:18):
US will be a global powerhouse when it comes to soccer.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
So you sound like you might be an actual soccer fan,
not just like those of us who pay attention kind of.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Every four years. Yeah, yeah, okay, so maybe you can
help me out here. What should I be watching?
Speaker 3 (05:32):
So, you know, because like you know, oftentimes it's one
nothing or nothing nothing or two to one or whatever.
There's not a lot of scoring. What should I be
watching to get excited about in between the goals?
Speaker 4 (05:45):
You know, it's really just all about the movement of
the match. That's you know, the flow of the game,
the ads and flows, the momentum shifting, the passing. It's
just you know, people will call the beautiful game for
a reason and it's there's a poetry to it, and
it's really a lot of you know, you have the
(06:05):
set plays that come up along in the games with
corner kicks and free kicks that you know, we saw
the US of great success with this tournament. But it's
the free flowing nature of the game. I think that
draws a lot of people to it. So it's just,
you know, you got to find excitement and the build up,
so to speak.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
I thought the announcers did a pretty good job.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
I feel like they were like when you watch the
NFL during the regular season, the announcers assume that you know,
you're an educated fan. Then you get to the Super
Bowl and they start pointing out like really basic things
because they know there's a lot of people watching who
don't understand the sport. When you get to the Super Bowl,
I feel like the announcers are doing a pretty good
job of that. Yesterday they pointed out some things like
(06:46):
I didn't know, like, you know, look the way this
guy followed this guy, So this guy was undefended, et cetera,
that they might not normally point out. It was for
dumb people like me that made it a lot more interesting.
Speaker 4 (07:00):
Right, And I think that's a big part too, that
will lead's even more growth here in the US, is
that you know, you're not treating people like they're beneath
you for not knowing the game. You want to welcome
in people, you know, you want to give them a
little push into the beautiful game and let them fall
in love with it just as much as the diehards.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
Have before I let you go.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
So I read this interesting piece over the weekend and
it was snarky. It was kind of sarcastic, but it
was The headline is basically, you're welcome world. The idea
was that if the United States cared about soccer, you'd
never get to win a World Cup. So the only
reason it's exciting is that different teams could win. If
we cared about it the way we care about the NFL,
(07:43):
the NBA and Major League Baseball, you'd never win.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
Do you think there's anything even close to a truth
to that?
Speaker 4 (07:49):
I think a little bit, you know. I found the
world's reaction to the whole red card situation with flow
Bell again a little funny because for once the US
had a player or the rest of the world didn't
want on the pitch because he's that good. So I
found out I almost took ahead as the badge of
(08:09):
honor that people were getting up in arms about the
US having a decision like this go their way because
everyone knew that it clearly benefited the US team. So yeah,
you know, I think a lot of people have looked
at the US as a sleeping giant when it comes
to soccer, and they know if that sleeping giant ever
(08:29):
woke up the whole power, you know, right, situation could shift.
Speaker 3 (08:34):
Well, you look at the Olympics, we win, you know,
when he was win the most medals and all the Olympics.
I mean, so if we cared about soccer, I mean
you know a picture some of our wide receivers, running backs,
if they decided to play soccer.
Speaker 4 (08:48):
Are imagining if Lebron had picked soccer instead of basketball exactly.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
So, I actually haven't talked about today the whole thing.
So one of our great players got a red card
that's basically like a really really bad foul, and he
wasn't supposed to get to play yesterday. The story is
Trump called the head of the soccer organization FIFA. Then
FIFA announces, hey, your best player can play. They changed
(09:15):
their mind on the penalty. So that doesn't happen on
a regular basis where FIFA changes their mind on penalties.
But just as a guy understands soccer, looking at that play,
was that a mistake by the officials or not?
Speaker 4 (09:29):
It was, in my opinion, a very very tough red
card to give out. You look at it in real
time and you could tell that there was no intent
there from Belligan to come down on the opponent's ankles
with the spikes. Unfortunately, though, whenever you go spikes up,
it is a bit of a risk to get a
(09:50):
red card. Yeah, and you know, the ref deemed it
bad enough to give him a red, So but yeah,
the whole situation was very odd. You know, it's nothing
that we've ever seen before in the middle of the
World Cup. We've seen it before, like in this very tournament.
Christiano Ronaldo was the benefit of the same thing. He
(10:11):
was supposed to miss the first two matches of the
group stage due to a red card Darren qualifiers. They
used the same clause they used to suspend Balligan's suspension.
They applied it to Ronaldo and he was able to
play in the first two group games. But that was
before the World Cup, and so people kind of you know,
I don't think people were too pleased with that decision
when it happened, but it was before the World Cup,
(10:32):
so it was a little easier to swallow. The fact
that this happened right in the middle of the tournament
with no transparency, I think is what rubb people outside
of the US the wrong way.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
Yeah, so I know it was a common chant among
the Belgians overturned this. Yeah after their big win yesterday.
Speaker 4 (10:49):
Yeah, yeah, they earned the right to control the US
a little bit after that performance yesterday.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Absolutely, Anthony Martinez, great job. I really appreciate it. We'll
keep you in mind if we ever need to talk
about soccer or anything else.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
Again, it sounds great, Thank you so much, you bet you. Yeah,
we hadn't got into that.
Speaker 3 (11:03):
So Trump made a call to the guy who runs FIFA,
that's the soccer.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
Organization running the whole tournament.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
Then the next day FIFA comes out and says the
American player can play. Obviously, that stinks. I mean, that
looks stinkses and smells. That doesn't look good. Whether Trump
strong armed the guy or offered him a bunch of
Trump coin or whatever, it changes mind.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
I don't know. I looked at the play.
Speaker 3 (11:30):
I don't know anything about soccer, but it certainly looked incidental.
Although they don't do that. It's not like it's a
regular thing for them to overturn calls. But FIFA's corrupt
as hell and has been forever. They've gotten caught in
all kinds of bribing, scandals for nominating host countries or whatever.
(11:51):
All world organizations, FIFA, who un Olympic Committee.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
They're all corrupt. They always all are, And I understand
why people don't understand that.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Anyway, it didn't look good to have Trump put in
a phone call and the next day, you know, the
American gets to play, so maybe it's best from that
standpoint that we lost, just so that that controversy is over.
And of course, because Trump's involved, all of a sudden,
people who aren't soccer fans clearly that he should have
been kicked out on that play because you hate Trump,
all right, whatever arms Trump and Getty