1-3-4. Fulham beat Miami 5-0 in 2001 in a friendly played on a baseball diamond. IIRC, Fulham scored 4 times in the last 10 minutes of that match.
I was puzzled by the several references the announcer made to how dazzled the DC players must be by the size of the crowd and the size of the stadium at White Hart Lane. That's just sloppy journalism. Perhaps there is little or no reason why he should have known the career details of a bunch of obscure American players, but the fact sheet should have told him that United's home stadium seats 57,000, some 20K bigger than White Hart Lane. True, the crowds are much smaller, especially given the fact that DCU finished dead last in the league (13K this year). Still, in the past they have played for 20 and 25K several times a season, and had the place filled to capacity in 97 for the championship game. So, if anything surprised the DC United players about White Hart Lane it probably was how small it is for the home turf of such a storied team. Are all the English stadiums that small?
Replay? Surely FSW will retelevise, encore presentation and all that. Details, anyone (nothing currently on their website)?
Some of the DC players probably were impressed. But the players who play for there respective national teams have seen tougher crowds.
tv listings FSWe Summomubeeeaaach!!! Fvcking FSWe won't show the match at all, not even a 1AM reair, but I can get all the crappy MFL precopalibertadores I want for wks. 2 wks now, no EPL, no Bundesliga, no UEFA qualifying, but Oh we got plenty of MFL 2nd division games for ya! Nothing like watching Pachuca v Tigres playing on a sand lot in front of 5000 fans, goats & chickens for the 17th time. That's it, I'm moving to a complex that has ATTBi or Turner, cause charter is killing me.
DCU made MLS look very good. Klinnsman commented on the quality of play, and the announcers gave the league and US soccer many a boost. It was a good show, and our lot won. Couldn't ask for anything more. Wade's post-match interview was also a bright spot -- he came across as intelligent and well-spoken, and he admitted that the English game represents a real step up from his own league and that DC and guests were all happy to have taken part in the charity match. The team left a good impression, and the lads come home with fond memories.
I don't see how Eddie Pope, who's been to two World Cups, or Etcheverry, who's been through South American qualifying, would be put off by the atmosphere of a charity match at White Hart Lane.
you obviously have never been to a British football stadium.... some of the more smaller grounds can be very intimidating.. for one.. the crowd is right next to the pitch, the fans are chanting constantly... the sound reverberates throughout the ground... in most US grounds and even the grounds used for the world cup... the sound is not as trapped in as it is in the smaller grounds. I was at the rose bowl when the world cup was in the US and it was nothing compared to the last match i went to in england and watched leeds v bolton..at elland road... most us players are used to playing in 50k stadiums with a crowd of 2-3k... all blowing boat horns and banging a drum.... i would say the commentator got it right... even the dc coach mentioned the atmosphere... Cantona----
You're right about stadium size, but not about crowd size. I believe the average MLS attendance is around 15K. DC United's was 13K this year, way down from 17K of a couple of years ago as a result of three successive, bottom or next to bottom of the pack finishes. At one point the announcer explicitly referred to the SIZE of the stadium, not just the crowd and atmosphere, suggesting that the DC player were awed by it. Not likely. I was very surprised that it seated only 36K. I would have thought double that for a team as famous as Tottenham.
I've been to several English stadiums. The atmosphere was fantastic in all of them, even the Highbury Library. I had a great time. My point, however, is that Eddie Pope just played South Korea, in South Korea, during the World Cup. He also played against Iran in France '98. Etcheverry has had to play qualifiers in places like the Bombonera. As great as White Hart Lane is, I don't believe that the atmosphere there for a charity game compares to the intensity of the other situations some of these players have been in during their careers.
Not to flame, but this proves how little respect MLS and American futbol in general garners. DC averaged nearly 17k, while Dallas & Colorado(which play in +65K venues) were the weakest still avg 13k. Avg Attendance Azteca stadium seats 110k and prob has 125k unofficial or so shoe horned in for your spare to fair US/El Tri qualifier. Plus Costa Rica's little matchbox stadiums rocks as loud & has more urine bombs than even the most raucous Euro match. Sorry, but the veteran US players, El diablo and Moreno know all about playing in front of big, hostile crowds. note to self: switch 2 decaff
"My point, however, is that Eddie Pope just played South Korea, in South Korea, during the World Cup. He also played against Iran in France '98." -------------- I was at both these games and you're right those games were a gazillion times more intense then a Thursday night charity kick around in merry old England. I thought the announcer was pretty complimentary from what I heard.
Jeez - 40 posts just cause a guy was filling air by saying that United were happy to be playing at Spurs. (About the same thing Ray Hudson said in his pre-match interview) And you realize 72k would be the biggest capacity for any club stadium in the UK. Old Trafford and Celtic Park aren't that big. Plus, Spurs play in a city with 12 other professional clubs.
It used to hold 48,000 before going all-seater. Most stadia in the UK are shoe-horned in like fenway park so expanding them is always difficult, plus the fact that in the UK the club has to pay for the building work itself - there are no stadiums paid for by the city. Who was covering this game though? Friendly matches such as this one don't ever get covered by English TV channels so I'm amazed there was any commentary at all. Apart from spurs fans and bigsoccer posters, nobody in the UK even knows this match took place.
But the impressive part of the broadcast was that he DID know a lot about the DC players. Given the complete irrelevance of the game, I thought it was amazing how well prepared the announcer was. And there was not an ounce of the usual patronizing, "oh isn't it cute, the US lads trying to play football with us" attitude. Quite the contrary, he was very respectful, almost too a fault, of the DC side. And he was quite on the mark, Bennie looked like he was auditioning for an English side, and quite successfully, I might add. As far as the attendance/atmosphere stuff, much as I love my MLS, you can't pretend the atmosphere at MLS comes anywhere close to and English ground.
Duh. Spurs played about 20 guys over the course of the game. DC didn't. No one cares if they won. It was a high-speed scrimmage and a damn fun one at that to play in, from what I can tell. What a great thing for Quaranta, Convey, Olsen, to say they played against Klinsman in White Hart Lane. What a great memory. It was DC's job to play high speed soccer without getting too stuck in. For that DC did very well. I doubt Wade Barrett was thrilled he beat the team having a testimonial. Personally, I'd like to see MLS and the English First develop a minitournament. The US teams that played in the USOC final could play two games in England against 2 teams newly promoted to English First, in their pre-season. It would be a USOC perq, and would give newly promoted teams a competitive scrimmage to play before they went into their First Division Schedule.
Exactly Viking 64. It was a charity match. It didn't matter who won or lost, all that mattered is that the fans enjoyed themselves. DCU I'm sure had a great experience, even if they had lost. On the other hand, I thought Benny looked good.