Welcome to the GP Soccer Podcast! (S14 E14)

                         Welcome to the GP Soccer Podcast!  (S14 E14)

Proud member of the Sports History Network and endorsed by the National                                                  Soccer Coaches Association of Canada.     

Host Giovanni Pacini welcomes his worldwide audience to yet another exciting show. Don't forget this season will feature World Cup "bonus content" during the World Cup.

This week's "Conversation with the Coach" is with legendary US soccer professional Bill Nuttall. "Coaches Corner" features a Unisport segment on playing without fear. "News and Analysis" will feature Giovanni Pacini with news from the AP and the Boston Globe. Ralph Ferrigno checks in with commentary regarding the final matches and tournaments before the World Cup. The "American Soccer Revolution" features Giovanni Pacini discussing the value of young players watching World Cup matches. 

The GP Soccer Podcast features new shows every Wednesday and can be found anywhere you listen to your podcasts. Listeners are encouraged to "Like" and "Subscribe" the GP Soccer Podcast and share the show amongst those within their social media network! Those interested in advertising on the show can contact host Giovanni Pacini at gp4soccer@yahoo.com. And be sure to check out the show website at www.gpsoccerpodcast.com. 

                    GP Soccer Podcast enjoys continued support from-
United Goalkeeping Alliance - Music Meets Sports - National Soccer Coaches Association of Canada - The Sports History Network - Feedspot.com - GP Voice Over Services - Zone 14 Coaching

GP Soccer Podcast welcomes a new sponsor- Zone 14 Coaching! Check it out at Zone14coaching.com. Use promo code GP20 for 20% off!

To purchase a signed copy of Dr. Joe Machnik's book- "From the Sandlots to the World Cup: 7 Decades of American Soccer", e-mail "Dr. Joe" at joemachnik@no1soccercamps.com. Be sure to mention the GP Soccer Podcast!

Enjoy the show!

Transcript

1:21

Well, hey there, everyone. Giovanni Picini here, your host of the GP Soccer Podcast. Welcome to all of you around the world tuning in to this week's episode of the GP Soccer Podcast. My goodness gracious me, so much soccer, so little time, because uh as I record this, we are a mere 10 days away from the kickoff of the World Cup. Uh things are really, really gearing up. A lot more conversation taking place out there, a lot more predictions, a lot of banter going back and forth uh across the media and social media regarding the upcoming World Cup. So it's very, very, very exciting. Uh, we're gonna squeeze in some uh World Cup uh news here in the this uh this week's episode of the GP Soccer Podcast. A couple of housekeeping things. Uh we're gonna be wrapping up this season, season 14 of the GP Soccer Podcast. The episode after next, so that'll be June the 17th. Next week, next week on June the 10th, the uh when things roll out, uh, will be featuring a FIFA World Cup special, where uh yours truly, Giovanni Piccino, will head up a panel, a terrific panel of uh soccer experts. Rob Ellis, who used to be the uh our contributor for the European Soccer Report and author of the book, The Soccer Coach's Toolkit, will be a member of the roundtable. Renato Cababianco, a regular guest here in the GP Soccer Podcast, former team administrator for the 1994 U.S. Men's National Team. Ralph Rigno, legendary college soccer coach here in the New England area, and the current contributor of the European Soccer Report. And last but not least, the great John D. Benedictus, who's the executive director of the National Soccer Coaches Association of Canada. So the five of us will uh get around the round table, a virtual round table, and we'll uh talk about all things World Cup. The following week will be the best of season 14. We'll take a week hiatus, and then there'll be some bonus content. We'll gear up again on that Wednesday morning uh and talk about what is going on in the World Cup. And uh there'll be lots to talk about there. Checking into the GP Soccer Podcast Mailbag, a couple of nice uh emails regarding last week's show uh where I interviewed uh Dan Abrahams, who is a noted um sports psychologist and performance expert. And uh I always like to share some good stuff. And uh and Dan is a terrific guest. He's uh been on the show a couple of times, so I want I wanted to share this. So, dear Giovanni, I wanted to reach out and let you know how much I enjoyed last week's episode of the GP Soccer podcast featuring Dan Abrahams. Your conversation with him was insightful, practical, and incredibly relevant for coaches, players, and parents who are trying to better understand the mental side of performance. Dan's discussion of the book Compete really stood out to me, especially the idea of building a mental playbook for performing under pressure. As someone involved in the game, I appreciate how he made sports psychology feel accessible and actionable rather than abstract. It was clear why he was so highly regarded in the field. Thank you for continuing to bring knowledgeable guests like Dan onto the show. Episodes like this one provide tremendous value to the soccer community, and I look forward to hearing more conversations like it in the future. Best regards, Alex. Well, Alex, thank you very much uh for that very, very kind um uh kind uh email. Uh yes, indeed. Dan is uh one of the best in the world when it comes to uh sports psychology performance. We've got a second interview that I'll share with you. Hello, Giovanni. I just finished listening to your recent GP Soccer podcast episode with Dan Abrahams, and wanted to thank you for such a strong interview. Dan's expertise in sports psychology came came through immediately, and I thought his comments about confidence, focus, and handling pressure were especially meaningful for anyone involved in competitive sport. His new book, Compete, sounds like an outstanding research resource for athletes and coaches who want to improve performance by strengthening mindset and preparation. I also appreciate the way you guided the conversation, asking thoughtful questions that help bring out ideas listeners can apply in real training and match situations. Please keep featuring guests who can bring who can bring high-level expertise with everyday coaching realities. This episode was one of the most useful I have heard recently, and it reminded me why your podcast continues to be such a worthwhile resource for the soccer world, uh, sincerely Taylor. Uh, you are way, way too kind to me. It uh deservedly, all those compliments go toward Dan and his his expertise in his book, but I certainly uh appreciate uh the kind words uh for yours truly as well. As I as I've always said, you know, the GP Soccer Podcast uh you know functions on three pillars. It is to inform, it is to educate, and it is to entertain. And um, if I can check those three boxes each and every week, then I guess I've done my job. And I've been very, very fortunate over these 14 seasons to have uh interviewed, uh, had on this show a number of very, very high-profile soccer professionals from around the soccer world. Um and I and I say this all the time, I sometimes learn as much as you do. Uh I don't know everything about the sport of soccer. I'm trying, but I don't know everything. And oftentimes uh these conversations I have with these terrific guests are as enlightening for me as they are for you. Today's show, today's show, terrific show, conversation with the coach is with Bill Nudall. And Bill, I mean, heck, he's won so many hats in the in uh the game here in the United States. And he's he's a true multi-multi-era figure in American soccer. He was a goalkeeper, he was a coach, executive, a broadcaster, and a business leader whose career spanned over five decades. And he and I are gonna have a wonderful conversation about the kind of the recent history of the game uh and his involvement uh with the sport of soccer over his many, many, many years. In Coach's Corner from Unisport, playing without fear. Uh, this is a terrific segment in Coach's Corner that for all levels of player. I don't care whether you've got grassroots players, you've got you know, middle school, high school, club, uh, even at the professional level. Heck, um this particular topic, playing without fear, is one worth listening to. Soccer news and analysis with yours truly from the Associated Press and our local Boston Globe, our European Soccer Report. I'll be Ralph Rigno talking about the latest European and World Cup report. And in the American Soccer Revolution and the final block of the GP Soccer Podcast, why it's important for kids to watch the upcoming World Cup. It's a wonderful opportunity for these kids to uh to watch and appreciate some of the world's greatest players. Do what they do. Checking boxes, checking boxes, checking boxes. We've got three good ones here in terms of checking boxes. Well, let's start with, you know, uh Patti San German, PSG, as they are affectionately called. Um heck, they just won back-to-back European championships by beating Arsenal 4-3 on penalties in a dramatic final uh in Budapest that uh, well, at the end of full-time uh ended in a 1-1 tie. Uh Luis Enrique, he became a three-time winner as a coach and uh has molded a team that uh, I mean, it it's it's too good for I mean for any any team on the continent that that uh that it has to offer. And that includes Arsenal, a team that just won the Premier League last week and topped the first stage of the Champions League with a perfect winning record. But you know what, at the end of the day, that that really didn't matter because in Pushkas Arena, PSG uh reaffirmed its you know its status as heck, just say it what it is. They're a dominant force. It is difficult to win the the the Champions League. It is difficult. You all know that. To do it back to back is nothing short of sensational. Um you know, after they they did away with Interbilan 5-0 in last year's final, uh PSG just they endured a tougher foe. You could say that about Arsenal. Uh as Arsenals, they sat, they sat deep and relied upon their defense in in this competition. Um but, you know, as you might expect, when you when a team sits deep, you you got a team that dominates possession, and PSG dominated possession. And but they created very little after going behind Kai Harbart's goal in the sixth minute. However, it took uh Ospana Dembele uh you know a penalty in the 65th minute to level the score and then eventually take the game into extra time for the first time in no 10 years. Um waited 22 years to get his hands back on the Premier League uh title trophy, Arsenal's weight in Europe continues. It goes on and on and on. Now, get this. This was this was its 226th game in the European Cup or Champions League. No other team has played in so many matches without being champion. Now, by scoring the early uh scoring so early, Arsenal, they they pretty much set the tone, and they were very comfortable sitting back and soaking up pressure. Um Arsenal was limited to about 24.5% possession, um, the lowest in a final since records uh began on this uh since 2004. Um you know, when you when you decide that you want to sit and absorb pressure and hopefully that that stands, or you decide to sit back in that low block and hope that you can get a counter to make it. Well, in this case, 2-0, because um Arsenal did score very early in the game, as I noted in the sixth minute, uh, it can come back and bite you in the rear end. Specifically, it's it's tiresome. It is difficult, it is challenging to sit and defend and defend and defend on the opposite opposition, in this case PA PSG, has got the magnificent ability to move the ball around with amazing speed, with amazing technique and amazing accuracy. Defense is moving, moving, moving. Every player has to move, uh, the the blocks have to move, the entire team has to move uh to adjust to uh the possession that's being in the possession of the ball that's being maneuvered around you. But it almost worked out. It almost worked out. There were two terrible penalties taken by uh taken by Arsenal that uh eventually uh allowed PSG to uh to retain that title. So PSG, congratulations, congratulations uh, you know, on that final. Next up at checking boxes, we've got our United States national team that just uh completed a match. 3-2 against Senegal uh this past weekend. Uh they earned a 3-2 victories, I noted, over 14th ranked Senegal in the penultimate tune-up before the 2026 FIFA World Cup. Kicks off when it kicks off. The match, it featured really fast starts, and maybe some defensive lapses, and certainly some standout attacking performances, especially from Christian Pulisic. Um that first group, that first group that started the first half was pretty special. Uh I was very, very impressed with their ability to really possess and move the ball around as well as they did. It was terrific to see Christian Polisic uh finally score and kind of take that uh uh monkey off his back, so to speak. Um in the first half, it was 1-0. Serginho uh Dest. He hit a uh a nice uh nice ball from Christian Polisik after a really nice build-up, which uh also involved Ricardo Pepi, which had a who had a wonderful game as well. The game with 2-0 in the 19th Bennett, uh, the aforementioned, Christian Polisik, he doubled doubled um the lead, uh rounding a goalkeeper past Morichao after a through ball from Pepe. Once again, Pepe did a nice job. 2-1 in the 43rd minute, Sadi Omane, very difficult to maintain, uh to uh you know keep in check. Uh he pulled back uh to one goal for Senegal and he finished a nice move assisted by Jabi Bijara. The U.S. dominant early, as I noted. And at one point, at one point, as I went through all the statistics here, um, they had 50, they completed 50 passes to Senegal's seven. Um but again, as I noted, Senegal grew into the match and late in the first half. Now, in the second half, the second group for the United States went in. I believe there were 10 substitutions that went in, and things changed. The the possession, the the dynamism of that second group in the second half was did not match that of the first group in the first half. It did pick up after a while, but it it took a while. It took a while. Um, you know, it uh in the 52nd minute it was 2-2. Monet struck again. He'd level the match. Finally, it was 3-2 in the 62nd uh minute, following Bulligan. Balligan, he uh kind of restored the U.S. lead and composed a really, really nice finish. It was nice to see him hit the uh uh score a goal. And the U.S. interestingly had two additional goals disallowed in the second half, uh, and which showed you know a continued attacking threat. Um so what what looked good, what didn't look good as I noted? Well, again, in the first half in particular, had really sharp attacking combination combinations, uh, as I noted, well, at one point, you know, being able to string 50 passes together. Uh you saw Christian Pulisek, uh, Ricardo Pepe, Sejunior Desk, really doing a nice job with um, you know, uh making making the attack, especially in the attacking third, really, really dynamic. Um some of the things that that looked good, you know, Pochettino had 10 halftime substitutions, which gave people players, and it was good to be able to use that many players. I would like to have seen them compete at a at a higher level. But the def the areas of some concern, the defense. The defense was, and particularly the organization, but they were vulnerable to quick transitions, and you saw that in the second half when uh Senegal was able to win the ball and counter quickly, and you see the United States uh chasing, did a did a lot of chasing. And we got to keep in mind uh Chris Richards' ankle injury. It remains a question mark. Uh will he be able to play? Will he not be able to play? Um, we'll we'll see. Um what's next? Well, the United States concludes uh its World Cup send-off uh on June the 6th versus Germany. I suspect that uh Coach Pochettino will be using the 11 players that um he thinks is gonna start the World Cup. I don't know if there's room for experimentation at that particular um, you know, that particular uh you know time when you're one match away. But we'll see. Um Senegal is a good side, but they're not Germany. They're not Germany. So that's gonna be very, very, very interesting to see. But uh kudos to the S for pulling out a victory. Checking boxes, the final box to check. We've we've been hearing a lot lately relative to the selection of this UN's men's national team, how uh Mauricio Pochettino decided to inform the players um you know if they made the team or not. Uh as he as he noted, uh I'm gonna share a bit of audio for you about about his process, he said he spent two weeks of sleepless nights uh while he was trying to sort out the roster, and he was criticized uh for emailing instead of calling uh those folks who didn't make the cut. In particular, you know, midfielder, uh Diego Luna and uh Tanner Tesseman, who plays at Lyon. Um, it's it's not terribly difficult to pick up the phone and uh and you know express disappointment that they didn't make the uh that they didn't make the uh the cut. Um it's the least a coach can do when you've had you have so many players in a pool that contribute to this process that ultimately allow us to get to down to 26 players and position ourselves to hopefully do well in this World Cup. Just because you didn't make the team did does not mean that you didn't you didn't uh contribute. And the all you're gonna hear expresses that. It'll be from Jesse Marsh, who is the uh the uh head men's coach for the Canadian national team. And you're gonna really kind of be interested to hear the the contrast and how they how they deal with it, particularly the tone that uh Mr. Pochettino um you know used in terms of uh uh defending his position. You know, I was a coach for a long time. I coached high school, I coached college for a gazillion years, and I was always in the position each year where uh you know we're players were cut. Players just didn't make the squad. And uh I always made it a point to tell the players why. Um, you know, way, way, way back in the day, I put the list up on the bulletin board of those who did make the team, and then I would I would say, well, I'd like to speak to all of you, the rest of you that did not make the team, and I'll and I'll tell you why. I'll tell you why. Um it's the least you can do. You know, sports is a very emotional thing. Sports is a very human thing. And as human beings, I just think it's a it's an appropriate uh thing to do that uh when someone doesn't make a team, you tell them why. Because oftentimes that the reasons you tell them why might be the type of advice that eventually might serve them well in the future that they might make the team the second year, or might that make the team, you know, in you know, someplace else later in their soccer career. Um so I want to play that video, uh that audio now, and um you uh kind of absorb it and see what you think. I was a player. When I I didn't make the roster, I didn't want that my coach called me. I coach and I say, Oh, which is the reason that I am not in the roster? What are you going to say? I'm going to lie. If I communicate 55 player in the provisional roster, I think is that is not the way. And come on. Because if I call, it's about myself. I say, Oh, I call, I am very human, I won't call in and then give an explanation. Come on, that is bullshit. I had either conversations or left voice messages with 27 players that had been with us at some point or another. So I think it's really important that the national team coach shows respect to all of the people that have been part of the program to help get it to where it is now. And that was the least I felt I could do to these people that had dedicated themselves to trying to help the national team be what it is. So I'm very thankful for everybody's commitment to this. Um I couldn't have asked for more from any of them, really. And and and a lot of them, I flat out told them that based on their their their quality, their personality, and their commitment, that they deserve to go to the World Cup, even though I wasn't selecting them. Like, think about that. That's a tough message to give. But again, I told all of them, be ready. It's not, it's, you know, it's uh no right now, but that can change. And there you have it. You have two very distinctly different uh approaches to the issue of uh notifying players who did not make the roster. Uh again, uhciatino, you could just tell by the the tone of voice, um, how uh uh stern he was uh in terms of uh defending his position and uh conversely that of Jesse Marsh. Uh so there you have it. That's the opening block of the GP Soccer Podcast. We're gonna break for a couple of commercial messages, and we'll begin on the other side. We'll re-engage with a conversation with the coach, or I have a wonderful conversation interview with Bill Nutall. Don't you dare go anywhere. Youth soccer has changed. Expectations are higher, but systems haven't kept up. Coaches juggle endless tasks, players chase progress they can't measure, and clubs struggle to create consistency across teams. Zone 14 Coaching was built for this moment. A company built by coaches for coaches, Zone 14 coaching next generation journals of coaches and players help plan every practice, reflect on what worked, and track progress all season long. Built on intentional coaching and backed by neuroscience, Zone 14 coaching brings structure and purpose to your training. The founders of Zone 14 Coaching watched in awe as some of the game's best tacticians and mentors spent every precious moment with a simple pen and paper, meticulously sketching, writing, and planning in a journal. It was a powerful and humbling sight. The foundation of great coaching was a commitment to preparation and a passion for player development. This simple observation sparked a question What if we could give every coach, from the passionate parent at the recreational level to the club coaching director, access to the same? Same level of structured thoughtful planning. Zone 14 Coaching is the answer. Visit zone14coaching.com and use the promo code GP20 for 20% off. And if you want to output your entire organization or even just one team, contact Zone 14 Coaching at Zone14Coaching.com for bulk pricing. Zone 14 Coaching, where high-level soccer knowledge and structured planning is accessible and simple. The United Goalkeeping Alliance is the world's number one virtual educational platform for goalkeepers. The UGKA emphasizes a goalkeeper culture while supporting goalkeepers around the world through every stage of their development. United Goalkeeping Alliance is an ever-growing network of goalkeeper coaches with agreed-upon goals of educating generations of goalkeepers around the five elements of a goalkeeper's development tactical development, technical knowledge, physical growth, psychological balance, and social connections. If you'd like to learn more about our memberships for goalkeepers, for goalkeeper coaches, and for clubs, please reach out anytime at 781-424-3028, or you can email us at info at United GKAlliance.com. Hey, this is Brad Knighton, goalkeeper coach for the New England Revolution 2. You're listening to the GP Soccer Podcast with your host, Giovanni Piccini. And welcome to the GP Soccer Podcast, Conversation with the Coach. Now, with today's guest, conversation with the coach would be the understatement of the year. Well, what does that mean? Well, our guest today is Bill Nuddall, and is he is one of the true multi-era figures in American soccer as a goalkeeper, a coach, an executive, a broadcaster, and business leader whose career spans more than five decades of the sports evolution here in the United States of America. He was a standard All-American at Davis and Elkins College. He went on to play in both the American Soccer League and the North American Soccer League before transitioning into coaching at Florida International University and later with the Fort Lauderdale Strikers. He served as the U.S. Soccer Federation's general manager for the national teams from 1991 to 1994, a pivotal period leading into the 1994 World Cup. Now, beyond the technical area, he became a respected sports executive with roles at Mitre, Diadora, and now his owner is Golden Viking Sports. Very few individuals have seen the American game from as many vantage points and with such longevity as Bill Nuttall. Well, Bill, with all that said, welcome to the GP Soccer Podcast. Thank you very much. I don't know whether all those years is a good or a bad thing, but it certainly has seen a lot of action. Well, the only thing I know, Bill, is that it goes by like really fast. Really fast. That's the only thing I'm quite certain. So we squeeze in as much as we can as the years go on, and you've certainly done that. So, Bill, here's where I'd like to start. We're going to go back a number of years in your life. You grew up in Pennsylvania and you wanted to start at Davison Elkins College. What first draw you to the game during a time when soccer wasn't yet a mainstream sport here in the United States of America? Well, I grew up outside of Philadelphia, suburb of Philadelphia, and um I was playing American football, and I was a little too small for American football at the time. So in 11th grade, I decided to try out for the soccer team at the high school. And um since I was a tight end and played first base in baseball and all that stuff, I decided I would try out as the goalkeeper. And as it turned out, I um picked up the game fairly quickly and started to understand how it all works. And um my had a had a couple of very good years in high school, and during my high school time, my coach, James Baxter, he said, I want you to, I've got a couple of teams in Philadelphia in the ethnic leagues that would be interested in your services as a goalkeeper. And uh so I that's what I ended up going into the ethnic leagues in Philadelphia, and that's where most big cities at the time uh soccer was um maturing, incubating, whatever the word is, that it was really stuck stayed with the uh with the ethnics. So you had the German-Hungarians, the South Philadelphia Italians, the Ukrainians, uh uh Hungarians that you you name it. So it was very much uh club-based where these these different um ethnic clubs had uh had their own clubs. They had soccer fields and a place to eat and congregate, and it's a social club. So uh that's where I really had an opportunity to fine-tune my skills and uh played in the uh in the ethnic leagues for actually close to four years, off and on, which were Sunday, Sunday afternoon games. And that was a time, Bill, where there was no such thing as youth soccer as we now know it, nor was there anything like club soccer as we now know it. Where did you hone your your soccer skills? Now, you were a goalkeeper, but nonetheless, you still got to have some soccer skill. Where did you hone your skills as a soccer player? And I guess I'll dovetail that question by asking, was it your athleticism? You mentioned you had played football that allowed you to take, you know, have the opportunity to play as a goalkeeper. Well, I and I was fortunate enough that my high school coach uh was very good at giving me the time and energy and the and the and the mentorship to get to hone my skills. So every time I went back to the Sunday leagues, I had an opportunity to uh improve my game. You know, at the high school season at the time, if I can recall, was maybe maybe a dozen games. So, you know, to get another 20 some games in on the Sunday afternoon in some very good talent. I mean, there was some really, really good players in this league. Uh, that gave me that opportunity. And as you said, uh youth soccer slash club sport, club soccer was non-existent. And um, so that was really the only path to understanding high school and then the uh the Sunday leagues were the only two real paths to get an opportunity to hone your skills. Now, your college teams won two NAI national championships. What made those squads special and how did those experiences shape your understanding of the game? Well, I, you know, I was um I first went to a junior college where I was junior college all-American goalkeeper. That is a unique story in itself. I went to a little school called Brandywine Junior College in Wilmington, Delaware. My first year there, they did not have soccer. My second year there they had soccer. So I was playing in the Sunday Leagues because it was in Delaware, which is another suburb of Philadelphia. Um, and uh the the junior college team, uh, we were 0 and 9. We did not win a game. That hurts. I think the the least amount of goals we ever let in was five, so we were losing 5-0, 5-1, 6, 7-8-1. But I was probably making 40 saves a game. So it was like soccer practice. Kick the ball out, turn around, make a save. So I probably hold the record as a junior college All-American first team goalkeeper, never having won a game in junior college. And and little, and little did you realize, we laugh about it, because we've all been there. We've all I was a goalkeeper as well growing up. There you go. You know, we've all been there. But little did you realize at the time, Bill, that the beating you were taking was contributing to your your ongoing development. Is that that safe to say? Yeah, absolutely. I would I couldn't wait to go back to practice to get a rest. You know, it yes, it was it was it definitely gave me the opportunity to continue uh and some serious uh shots on goal per game, etc. And you know, so the other coaches recognizing that, which I always appreciated, because the votes come from the other coaches for the NSCAA at the time. Now it's United Soccer coaches. So my second year there, that's when I went to Davidson Elkins um on a scholarship, and the coach was putting together a really good team. And uh so in 68 we won it, went undefeated. 69 we lost in the final um in overtime, and then 70 we won it again, uh, beating teams like Quincy College, which was at the time when you were there wasn't a D1, D2, NAIA. You played everybody. So we would play Howard, we played Pittsburgh. We Howard did second, my my third year that we played Howard, they uh they had won the national championship that year. So, and you know, you could play a St. Louis and you play a Southern Illinois, and so there was there was none none of this uh, oh geez, you're D1, you can't play a D2 team. It was it was all mixed right in there. Would you say, Bill, that um again, kind of circling back, all kidding aside, certainly, those those challenges that we put them, you know, uh, you know, get letting up so many goals and taking a beating, so to speak, did that did that uh you know heighten or elevate or strengthen your mentality that allowed you to eventually become a first-team All-American goalkeeper? I would say yes. I mean, anytime you get enough enough um uh enough practices, enough training, enough looks at different things, I definitely feel that I, when I went back to the Sunday leagues, I was feeling a lot more confident and had uh and continued to uh you know to improve, I would think. And one of your teammates, uh well known in the soccer world, was Hank Steinbrecher. Uh shared my audience who Hank Steinbrecher is and your relationship with him uh throughout the course of those years as teammates. Hank showed up in my junior year out of uh he was a hard-nosed Long Island kid out of Levittown, Long Island. He went to Mitchell Junior College up in Connecticut. So Hank came in our junior year and he played left back for us. So I was a keeper, he was left left defender. And you know, Hank was a just a hard-nosed, solid quality defender, and uh, of course, he and I became friends and were friends during the whole time, and then followed each other's career, not heavily, but did follow each other's career after uh after we graduated. So Hank then, of course, went on to uh for the 86 Olympics. Hopefully I'm right there, he was the venue director for the Harvard venue for the Olympics. Right. Um and from there he went on to Gatorade, and then from there he became Secretary General, CEO of U.S. Soccer once Alan Rothenberg was elected president of U.S. Soccer. So there's a lot in between all that. I don't know where you want me to start and stop. But no, no, good. No, I just want to make sure that that our audience understands who Hank Steinbrecher is and you know his impact on the game. And you you you stated that so so very eloquently there. Now, you played both in the ASL and the NASL, two leagues that helped, arguably, I guess, lay the foundation for today's professional landscape. What do you remember most about the level of play and the culture in those leagues? Well, the ASL was the longest standing league, uh, semi-professional, I guess you would call it. Um they survived through all the different maturations of of the different pro leagues and or people that were trying to play in a pro league. And it was a step up from the Sunday leagues, basically. They were pulling together top players from from the different Sunday leagues, including those in New York and Boston and uh Baltimore, D.C., up and down the East Coast. Um, so the ASL was a good quality league to play in. And uh and a lot of the guys I played on my Sunday League team with also came to um to the to uh you know to play in the ASL. Uh players like Walt Chesowitz, who was the coach at Philadelphia Textile and had a great great career at Textile and went on to Wake Forest and passed away, unfortunately, uh, who was really um Denmark Kramer's uh protege as far as starting up the coaching schools, um the A license and and so on, coaching schools for U.S. soccer. So everything gets intertwined pretty quickly. So the ASL was a great little a great league. Uh then the NS NASL started up, and um I guess they're in their second year or their second year probably when I was I got a call from Miami and asked me if I would come down and try out for their team. They needed an American goalkeeper. And at the time, you must you had to have two Americans on the field, two American citizens on the field at all times during the league. So a goalkeeper was was a good uh natural plus a field player, and depending on what the coach wanted. So I went down to Miami, uh, had the trial, made the squad. Uh my old coach was the head coach at Florida International University. I did my master's degree there on a grad assistantship while I was playing for the Miami Toros. So I was able to get plan a little bit for my future, just when if and when the uh my my soccer career uh came to an end. During that time, Bill, um there was at the NPSL, National Professional Soccer League. And help me with the chronology here, this that was a time when um teams from typically England would literally bring their entire team over here to the United States during the summer months and become a member of the NPSL. I think eventually the the early NASL. For example, we had the Wolverhampton Wanderers were were the Los Angeles Wolves. Were you were you involved? Were you playing during during that era where you had that kind of the influx of of British teams primarily coming here to the United States to sustain a professional league here in the U.S.? I was not. I think probably closer to um um closer, I would say two years had passed when I came into the NASL. So I was not part of that um at all. But I know what you're saying. They did play in these, you know, every, you know, five or six of the big cities had the English clubs come over and they had their own little their own league for that. I don't know, what was that, seven, eight, ten, ten weeks? Yeah. Here in Boston, we had the Boston Beacons. Yeah. I remember going over to Fenway Park with my dad and uh watching our our hometown Boston Beacons, and again, they were they were a team from from England. The team that they keep from England, the name escapes me. But the one thing I'll digress for about a moment, but you'll appreciate this. I remember at Fenway Park going to the games, and the they never took out the the uh pitcher's mount, and it was part of the field. And I can recall, you know, I was a I grew up as a soccer kid and my you know from an Italian family, and I said to my father, I asked him in Italian, I go, I go, you know, Papa, I go, the the the pitcher's mound is on the field. And the rubber and the rubber, not just the pitcher, and the rubber. That's how that's how little respect Boston Beacons got from our our Boston sporting community and Fenway Park. Um, well, and you know, it's um it's expensive to take that pitcher's mound off. Sure. Very expensive. Um I watched Louisville in the uh championship of the USL and several other. It it is a very expensive process. So money, I'm sure, was part of it. And Fenway saying, we'll give we'll wrench it afield, but we're not going to do any modifications. Yeah, we weren't quite there yet. We weren't quite there yet. Now, you were on the roster when Gordon Banks had arrived in Fort Lauderdale. What was it like sharing a locker room with a goalkeeper of that stature? Well, I you're that's that's another story unto itself. Ron Newman, so we were the Miami Toros, and Joe Robbie, the owner of the Miami Dolphins, took over the team when one when we were struggling financially, and Joe Robbie took over the team and decided to move the team to Fort Lauderdale, to Lockhart Stadium, which was a smaller stadium versus the Orange Bowl where we were playing. So 5,000 in the Orange Bowl was uh, you know, a cupful of sand in the ocean. It just didn't look very there was no atmosphere. So the decision was, and Ron Newman was the coach. Uh I went up to training camp, uh, was training for about four days when Ron called me into the office and said, Um, listen, we're gonna I'm bringing another goalkeeper and an experienced goalkeeper, and I've got a younger keeper right now in Van Taylor, so you're the odd man out. And I said, Well, I had a feeling that was going to happen. I said, but uh, can you tell me who you're bringing in as the goalkeeper? And I said, I'm you know, I'm I'm I'm very curious. And he said, Um, I'm bringing in Gordon Banks. And I said, Whoa, Gordon Banks, that is amazing. I said, can I, two things here. One is, can I keep training with the team, realizing that I'm not on the squad? You've told me I've been released, but I I would love the opportunity to just train alongside of Gordon Banks and get to know the guy. And at any time, Ron, you can tell me, listen, Bill, time for you to go. We got to move on. And uh, you know, that's that. So, meanwhile, so I'm I'm training now with Fort Lauderdale strikers, and Gordon Banks is now the goalkeeper. And I don't know how many people realize this or understand this. Gordon Banks was in a very serious car accident, and he lost his right eye. That is correct, yes. He's playing with one eye. Now it's tough enough to play goalkeeper, period. Try closing one eye, as you know, Giovanni, and start trying to figure that out. Balls in the air, balls on the ground angles, uh, all the traffic around you, and now you're doing it with one eye with a whole new depth perception. Don't even can't can't even fathom how he does that, did that. Um never saw the guy out of position, never saw him make a silly mistake that you'd be like, oh boy, that I can see where that one eye thing doesn't work. He was amazing. And on top of that, he was a perfect gentleman, professional, and just an all-around nice guy. Um, so yeah, that's my Gordon Banks story. So I ended up doing the television for for the Fort Lauderdale Strikers after that. Um and I was at FIU as the head coach. So um, you know, I was I had an opportunity to see Gordon in a lot of different lights, uh, off the field and on the field. Plus, uh, that's my experience with Gordon Banks. We stayed friends for probably 10 or 15 years after that. That's a wonderful that's a that's a great chapter of anyone's soccer book. That's wonderful. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. So let's let's fast forward. So, you know, coaching, broadcasting, leadership, that type of thing. Now, at Florida International University, you you compile a pretty impressive coaching record from a coaching standpoint. What was your coaching philosophy and and how did you adapt it to the American college environment? And I'll I'll I'll add a little bit more to It um compared to what we see in terms of today's tactics, strategy, methods, mindsets. How can you compare the two when you were coaching, how you adapted to the American college's uh environment, and then compare it, if you will, to what we see, I guess, in the modern era? Yeah, I I think I just, you know, looking back, it's really the quality of the player, the fitness level of the player, uh, the amount of games they're they were they're they're playing now, before they, you know, and a lot of the college guys are are coming out of very uh high-end camps, high-end uh clubs, and so they're getting a lot of games where, once again, back in the 70s, um their the youth situation was just starting, so the players that I had were pretty much like what what I was doing, playing in the Sunday leagues and getting some games under their belt. Uh the difference with Florida International was FIU was an upper division school. They were they were built to be a junior and senior and and master's program uh graduate level program because Miami-Dade community colleges, and there was three of them, plus Broward Community College, the Fort Lauderdale area, were graduating uh you know, were graduating associate degree uh students and so FIU was designed to handle those those students to bring them into the uh junior and senior year. So when I was coaching at FIU, I only could recruit junior college players. Um or at least those that have had two years of college somewhere that could transfer in as a junior. So it became a pretty interesting challenge from that standpoint. But having said that, my players were mature, more much more mature, because they've already played two years at at junior college plus whatever Sunday opportunities they had. So I had a more mature player coming in as a junior. And it creates environments, it's it's literally men versus boys, oftentimes. Um I was a head college coach for many years, uh, too many, I think, but I was a college coach for many years. And I remember the the the when I had made the conscious decision in terms of the recruiting efforts to pursue junior college players, everything changed because it was literally men among men amongst boys. Um and you know, obviously they were they were good players as well. So it does make a makes a significant difference in terms of you know what what a player can have someone who's bigger, stronger, faster, and has the associated skills, you know, is is gonna outdo, outplay, out jump, out shoulder, if you will, your typical 18-year-old freshman, you know, or 19-year-old sophomore, that type of thing. So some things just ha you know, have haven't haven't changed. Yeah, so it so my perspective is a little you know a little different than um in a lot of the schools that we played against, because they they did have good players, but they also could bring in some young players that were pretty good where I had to kind of wait it out. So it had its you know positive and negative uh effects in hopes to get because a lot of kids were grabbed at freshman and they were not leaving. Not like the portal now type of thing. Oh, that's changed. That's that's a conversation for another day. My goodness. Yeah, you got that right. It has absolutely changed the the the entire you know, athletic landscape. Never mind just soccer, but you know, collegiate collegiate landscape and then national uh name image nykless is a whole other you know um dynamic too that that has changed the the landscape uh in college athletics. But um so you were a play-by-play announcer. Again, just going back to my introduction and kind of share with the audience that you wore a lot of hats, you were a play-by-play commentator from ESPN's first ever soccer broadcast. What do you recall about that moment and how did you view soccer's place in American sports media at the time? Well, it at the time I was doing the um I was doing the radio and TV for the Fort Lauderdale Strikers. And I had done that for two years. And there was a rumor that there was going to be a company, a television company, that was going to be a 24-hour-a-day sports channel. And uh it was like, yeah, that'll never fly. You'll never be able to, you know, just because CNN was doing it with news, there's no chance of a 24-hour a day uh sports channel working. So um I found out it was on it was ESPN and it was also in Bristol, Connecticut. So, you know, you're like, Bristol, Connecticut's not the epicenter of uh broadcasting, but it's not LA. It's not New York. It's not any major city, really, though. It's a suburb of Hartford, okay. And uh, as you know, you're up in that neck of the woods. So I um found the address for ESPN and I sent them my my tapes of the games that I had done and said, you know, I'd be interested if you guys are gonna do soccer, I'd be very interested in uh in having a shot at things. And um heard nothing. So I was up in uh outside out in New York and then up in Connecticut. I was on a recruiting trip, and I said, I'm gonna track down this ESPN place in Bristol. I'd be curious to see what these guys are all about. So I'm driving down the street. I ask a guy in a gas station, because remember, you don't have GPS to send you stop at a gas station, ask for address for crew for directions. Yeah, you had to talk to somebody. I said, You heard this ESPN thing? And he says, Yeah, it's down there, it's down this road down here, about two miles on the right, and it's in a field over there to the right. I drive down the street, I'm driving, driving, driving, come to an open field, I look to the right, and it's a double-wide trailer sitting in the middle of this field. A little dirt road to it. I pull in, go inside, and there is um at the time they were called secretaries, and another guy to my left, whose name was Scotty Connell, who I did not know him from Adam at the time, and Scotty became the godfather of all of ESPN at the end of the day. So I said, Hey, um I this is ESPN. I sent in a demo. I don't know if you guys got it. And so the gal's looking at me like, uh, yeah, we probably don't have it. So the guy speaks up from the other side of the room. He says, Hey, wait, wait, wait, what'd you say? You sent in a demo table? I said, Yes, yes. So I introduced myself, said who I was, done some games. So you do soccer. I said, Yeah, I do soccer. Okay, um, send me some more stuff, and I'll make sure you get I get it this time. I said, Well, I actually have some with me. So I'm not gonna mail it to you guys again. So I leave it with him, go back to Miami, and uh I heard nothing. And about two weeks later, I get a call from this lady who is the secretary, and she says, Um, we need you to do Indiana versus Minnesota Big Ten Soccer College uh championship game, and it's in Bloomington, Indiana. I said, Um, well, let me backtrack for half a second. ESPN had negotiated with the Big Ten to do all of their championship games except basketball and football, because that money was all, you know, you know how that goes. So they were doing every small championship game inside of Big Ten and every sport you could think of. Soccer came up first because it was fall, and so the soccer thing. So I said, okay, that's fine. Uh how do we do this? And they said, Well, we're gonna pay you a fee for the game. Um, we got your hotel covered, just fly up there and then send us your expenses when you get home. I'm a college coach, you know. I'm not I'm not actually run, I'm not flush with money. I feel your pain. I feel your pain seeing what he has again looks like. And I'm like, um, so I said to my wife, I said, uh, this is what they want me to do. And she says, Well, we'll take a $500 gamble here and see what's up. So I flew up and uh met a guy by name of Lou Palmer, who was doing the six and the eleven o'clock in sports on Hartford Station there. And he and I did the game. Uh at the time they put it in a can after the game. There's a there's a courier that waits for you at the bottom of the stadium, takes the takes that to the airport and flies it back to Hartford, and then it is shown sometime after that. Uh as a tape delay. So that's that's what they did. Well, Indiana was top two teams in the country, and Minnesota was a club team at the time. Right. And it was 4-0 at half. So it's like, oh boy, here we go. I don't know what, you know, my first opportunity. Well, what am I going to say about this when it's men against boys? So I went home and sent my expenses up, and lo and behold, they mailed me a check back to cover everything. And um, I'm off to the races. They started giving me more games, and the NASL had indoor soccer games. Um, and I was doing some more college games, and uh at the end of the day, I did probably about 25 games before I became the assistant coach of the Fort Lauderdale Strikers. So a couple of weeks ago I had JP Della Camera on, um, and he and I were chatting about preparation. Preparation for, you know, for any match, whether he was doing an NWSL game, MLS, or in this case here for for the World Cup. What type of preparation were you able to do for the first broadcast? And did it get any easier or was it more challenging when you were doing subsequent, you know, uh broadcasts? What kind of book preparation were you able to do? Uh, not much. That's what I thought you were going to say, but I thought I'd ask anyways. Get there the night before, they give you kind of a roster lineup, they kind of give you some ideas, but uh very little preparation. Normally, the producer and directors in the truck were young kids, young guys, um, who were also cutting their teeth on uh on television. And um, you know, there's guys that I that were down in the truck, guy by name of John Wildheck, who does, was doing Monday night football forever. I mean, you know, these young guys is like, oh, I know that guy. That guy, yeah, yeah, he was right down in the truck just trying to trying to make a go of it, you know. So the preparation was um uh on the college level was was not too much. We really just got the uh got the game notes the night before, if you want to call it, we got the lineups, no game notes. Talked to the coaches uh before the game for a few minutes, which they gave no information. You know how that goes. And uh so yeah, so it was a good way to cut your teeth, but it was uh there was no whole wasn't a whole lot of preparation involved. There's a lot of improvisation that goes on when you're not when you don't have you know all the all the preparation that typically takes place in this day and age. You've you've got to be able to, you know, uh keep talking and have no dead air. Um that was certainly, certainly a challenge. Bill, let's talk about your your time uh with the U.S. Soccer Federation and the growth of the game. Now, you served as a the GM for the U.S. national teams from 91 to 94. What were the what were the biggest challenges facing U.S. soccer during that pre-World Cup period? Because that that was a that was a vital period for our national team, particularly the 94 team. Talk to my audience a little about your experiences uh in that era. Well, if if we can back up for a second and kind of I'm trying I I I'm gonna be probably wrong on my date, but uh, 88 or 89, the U.S. was awarded the 1994 World Cup. Um trying to think what FIFA convention that was, but U.S. was awarded the World Cup. So now you got the U.S. national team qualifying for the World Cup in Italy. Uh Paul Calligri's goal that against uh Trinidad and Tobago, you're putting him in, and uh you know the shot hurt around the world, whatever you want to call that. Um that they now you've got a college all-star team going to the World Cup in Italy. Uh you don't have a pro league. You have guys that are playing in college. Uh you don't have you have nobody playing in Europe, or you know, maybe I don't know whether there's a couple of guys playing in Mexico or not. But basically, you sent a college all-star team to the 1990 World Cup. And the naysayers were already out there saying, why would you give a third world country in soccer? Because that's really what the U.S. was. No pro leagues, they didn't have anything along those lines. So the U.S. was really a third world country in the world of soccer. Um, and that's the first time they had ever done that. Always the big guys got the World Cup, the Brazils, the Germanys, you know, Europeans. You know, they're they're they didn't go outside of the big guys for as far as putting the World Cups on. So now, 1990, the U.S. goes there and they hung in there. They have to give the guys credit. They fought hard and got, you know, really uh and left Italy without any points, but but they certainly put up a good fight. And so now, coming back from there, August of 1990 is when the they are now re-electing the president of U.S. soccer. That election comes up in August of 1990. And out of that, uh this candidate by the name of Alan Rothenberg uh goes up against Warner Fricker, who had been there for probably 10, 12, 15 years and wins the election. And so now you have Alan Rothenberg as the president of U.S. soccer. Uh he ran the venues, he ran the soccer piece for for um trying to think of the head of Peter Ubroth. He ran the soccer uh venues for Peter Ubroth for the Los Angeles Olympics. And that's how he met Hank Steinbrecher. Because Hank was in the Harvard venue. I'm kind of rambling here, but um hopefully it's making a little bit of sense as the. Yeah, you're laying the groundwork down nicely, absolutely positively. And the coach during that era was the infamous Bora Militinovich. Um 91 to 94, yes. Yeah. Who was and helped me out here, Bill, is it was a love-hate relationship. Either you love the guy or you hated the guy. Um I think too many people had hated him. I mean, I think maybe hating is too strong of a word, but you know, we're we're frustrated, maybe frustrated because his coaching style, and I I I I saw him firsthand. Um he was came up here in the Boston area and would train over at Babson College near where I live, and I see him see him in action. But uh, we all know the legend of Borbar Militinovich that he was a little unorthodox in terms of his approaches. And from what I have read and heard and listened, uh his main objective was to toughen this group of, heck, you said it best, these college kids that had no professional, uh no professional uh experience, but to toughen them up for the rigors of not just qualifying, but but getting into the World Cup. Um is that that safe to say? Is that a safe assessment? It is. I think what he brought in also was, yeah, Bora never asked a question that he didn't already know the answer to. He was very smart that way, and he was great at uh sizing up things. But what Bora would brought in was after World Cup for Mexico having a great result, World Cup with Costa Rica having a very good result, he brought in a lot of knowledge and experience as to how to prepare a team to get through those first three games. I mean, at the end of the day, your world is three games, isn't it? You get into the you get into the group play and you either get out of it or you don't. And if you don't, then you're a bum and you're probably fired and you move on. And if you get through the next round and the next, then it's of course that becomes so for the U.S. to even think that they could get through the first round, get through the the pool play, the group play, and get into a knockout round, it was like that that is absolute uh you know lunacy. They're never they're never gonna do that with this group of guys. And what Borah does is he can analyze talent, assess talent, and make a decision as to how he's gonna play with the talent he has and coach the living daylights out of those guys to play inside of that system. And so that's where I think the players would get in their mind, and most of the guys, we just had a huge 1994 soccer uh reunion in in California, which Renato Kapavianco attended, as well as my staff plus players. And to the player, they're saying, Yeah, we we thought he was he was a little bit on the odd side, but at the end of the day, you know, he got us where we needed to be. And um that's that was, I think, a real achievement. Don't were the guys frustrated? Did they feel that they were just doing something over and over and over again and not, you know, why are we doing this? Why are we doing this? Um, but he had a plan, he knew what he needed to do, and he knew how to prepare a team to play three games, because that's what you're really dealing with was three games to get you through. Everything else didn't matter. How many games you won and lost, and the friendlies, and this and that. And I say that now with Paul Chittino. I mean, they're tough on him, and they they, you know, and they're they're critical, and they're the players are not good enough, and this and that. At the end of the day, he's got three games ahead of him, and that's it. He's either going into the next round, or everybody's gonna say, see, we told you so. Yeah, going going back to that 94 squad, and with uh Alexi Lilis called uh Bohr Militinovich the mad scientist, and I I know that he and Eric Winalda had buttted. I think I think as the story goes, and you can help me out with that. Eric Wonalta actually left the team at one point. Uh and it wasn't until Bohr went went over to England and kind of had a nice quote-unquote conversation with with Mr. Winalda to get him back into the good graces of of the team, and eventually he did come back. But uh yeah, I mean it it's it all sorted itself out in a twisted sort of way, but it did sort itself out. Yeah. Staying on the 94 group, because it's such a pivotal era and team and world cup for this country. Looking back, what do you think the 94 World Cup did for the sport in this country, both immediately and then in the long term? Well, what it I think several things here. One is FIFA was okay with it, but the rest of the world was like, you can't have the you can't have the World Cup in the United States. These people don't know what they're talking about. They don't play professionally, blah, blah, blah. The thing that they underestimated was the United States is a big event country. We put on big events with our eyes closed, really. Um, and so they saw the most profitable, the most successful, the most highly attended games in the history of the sport, even today. Um and, you know, so that that's where that part was put to rest real quickly as to uh whether the U.S. could pull that off. Um then you get into now the team is getting some notoriety, 91 and 94, but we're still not a household name, not under the same scrutiny. And granted, I guess in some respects I was blessed because social media did not exist, so we didn't have to listen to all the pundits talking about how things should be operated. Um so, but you had a group of guys who were ready to fight and fight hard for things. The blueprint for the MLS was already on the boards. That was ready to go. They were already working with that in um uh simultaneously. With when they were building up for the World Cup. And then you know, you end up with a good result. American fans started to love the sport. And then you saw a real nice spike in youth participation after the 94 World Cup. And everybody's excited about that. So, and you started seeing our players, more of our players, going over to Europe because there was some there was a lot of credibility there. And we see the advent of MLS, and we know the history of MLS when it was formulated in 1996 and 2026, and uh arguably, you know, one of the accelerants, if you will, of developing high enough level players that they can be players that can be dispersed throughout Europe, but not just coming off the bench to play, but impactful players. Impactful players over the course of a relatively short period of time, which says a lot about the power of MLS and its capacity to develop those players and be able to send to send them abroad and contribute at some of the highest level clubs uh in the world. A couple of big questions before we kind of close out our conversation here. Um how do you assess the current state of U.S. soccer and not just the Federation, but this, but I talk about in terms of the landscape, both at the grassroots level and at the other end, the professional level. Well, people ask me all the time, what do I think the difference was when I was involved in in the 94 World Cup and what's happening since then and now? And I say it was money. We had no money. We were operating, I was putting on games, uh, finding games, finding places to make some money, generate some revenue, and also try to find games where my coach needed to have guys playing. We were, you know, we needed to have matches. So that that is, and then from there, you know, money came into it. Now all of a sudden, the coaching schools, player development, the youth system, um, women's soccer was was was given an injection of uh support. And of course, we know that story how tremendous they've done and what they've done over the years and their and their prowess inside of the uh women's game. So, you know, and it's become much more corporate. Um and so you've got, you know, and I even say was saying the other day I was just kind of calculating, I'd say the US roster right now, the average salary is about $1.4 million. Salary, average salary. You got some making a lot more, some in a little bit less. I mean that's that's a lot of money for guys playing the game now. And it's and they're and it's it's changed the it's just turned it into a business. And they're you know, you've got whenever you turn into a business, it becomes a different dynamic. And um at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter what all this white noise, noise, whatever you want to call it is, there's three games ahead of Pochettino and the boys. And they will show that they've got it or they will will not make it. And I think going kind of going back to our conversation a minute or so ago, I think FIFA, when they had uh anointed the United States for to host the the World Cup uh you know here in the U.S., I think they knew, and certainly was not a well-kept secret, they knew that there was this could potentially be the biggest soccer market on the planet. Big dollar signs, and you said it you said it great as well. We we run uh big events and we do it well, and that's just uh the opportunity to to generate amazing amounts of revenue to fuel a sport and to fuel all the things necessary that the sport needs to have to be to be on a on a global stage. On a global stage. Um they saw dollar signs to put it at a more rudimentary basis. They saw dollar signs, and and it there are dollar signs here, and it it paid off literally and figuratively it paid off. Um with all that said though, Bill, what do you believe, what do you think the U.S. still needs to get right in order to consistently compete with the world's top soccer nations? Because MLS is still looked upon from the from the from the eyes of the rest of the world as a you know, that's kind of a lower division, a second division, not quite. It's not Syria A. It's not the English Premier League, it's not the Bundesliga, it's not Liga und it's somewhere below there. What do we need to do to take that to that next step to put us in that same conversation, that same level of all of all those leagues, and and then some that I had just noted? I think, you know, I say that the MLS is still a selling league, they're still selling their better players to outside to go outside of the league. Um, and some of that's changing slowly. But once you start becoming a buying league and you start bringing in foreign players at the top of their game and the league versus uh some that are in either in the middle or the end of their career, uh I think that will help with uh giving some credibility to um to the MLS. I mean, what is it, 30 years old now, the league? 1996 was the first year, yep. 1996. 30 years old this league is now. And it's just gonna, it's I don't know if it'll ever uh we just have so much, so much the entertainment dollar gets so stretched here. Um it's tough to uh it's tough to bring soccer to the to the top top level. Yeah, and I always talk about you know that the the U.S. sporting landscape is entirely different than any other landscape from another country. We have football, we have basketball, we have baseball, we have hockey, we have lacrosse, we have rugby, we have tennis. We're a sporting country. The sporting landscape is very, very vast, which is great in one sense, but in terms of our sport, in terms of soccer, you know, it it is a it is a challenge. Um you you hear the argument all the time, and I I agree with this, Bill. Our best athletes still don't play soccer. They don't play. That's right. They don't play soccer. And that is and that is a you know uh a roadblock. That's a challenge uh for all of us involved in the game to want to develop players, you know, at the highest levels. At the end of the day, sure, you've got to have skill. I get all that, but not everyone has to be you know uh big and strong, but it certainly does help. If you're you're bigger, stronger, faster than than than the most, than most, and then the next guy. Um I don't know if we'll ever ever get beyond, at least not in my lifetime. I hope we do. I don't want to sound all doom and gloom. I hope we do, but at least in my lifetime, I don't I don't see that happening. I just don't see that happening. Um I agree. It's it's a it's gonna require um you know, and and soccer in the United States is still a middle, tougher middle class sport. Yes. Five, six, seven thousand dollars a year for your kid to play. Don't don't get me started. You know, yeah, I know, I hear you. I'm on that, I'm on your bandwagon there. I'm on your soapbox, but uh that's you know, so um it's uh you know, where do kids play in Europe? They play on the streets, they play in sandlot, they play on, they don't care, they just play. That's right. And that's another element we don't see here in the United States as well. In fact, I just finished a book, it's gonna be coming out literally with the next few days, um, called The Importance of Unstructured Free Play, Coaching with a Street Soccer Mentality. And the DNA, not to go overboard on my book coming out here, but the DNA of it all is to have coaching methods, coaching philosophies that is predicated on the street, street soccer. Um we all we all say this the same thing. Oh, the game, you know, the the best teacher is the game, the best teacher of the game. And uh but nobody puts their money where their mouth is, you know, when they when they do that. But I digress. The final, the final question, the final uh inquiry if I have for you, uh, and I so appreciate your time. The you uh the men's national, as you and I are recording this, the the the the official roster has been rolled up. We kind of know what it is already. It's been leaked. It's been leaked beyond leaked. Um, what are your thoughts on on the roster as you currently know it, and what's your prediction for how they'll do? Um, as far as the current roster, I'm you know, you can go around and around on 26 players, take out your three goalkeepers, 23 players. Um, how much action are 17 through 23 gonna see? And are we spending too much time worried about this one guy didn't make it, and I thought he was a better defensive midfielder or whatever, you know. Um that's good, that's good press and it's good social media. Uh but you know, his his 15 15, 16 guys have got to get it. Uh, I think he's he's got it as good as he's gonna get it. I who am I to say as far as what you know who I would have thought would or would not have made it. But um, you know, a lot of times you don't understand that people don't fully understand there's a chemistry in the locker room and on the field and amongst the players, it also is a uh uh you can't quantify that like you can whether he's a good player on the field or not. So there's a lot of variables that go into it. Um and the question, Paul Chittino, who's an experienced guy, uh that can be determined. As far as where I think they'll finish, I think this is a very difficult group. This is more difficult than it's a difficult group. It's not the group of death, but it is a difficult group. Paraguay will be tough, and they will be a physical team. Um, you know, then Australia, you know they're gonna fight. They're gonna come at you very tough. And then you draw Turkey. I mean, yeah. You draw Turkey, who should never be a fourth-seeded team, and that's your fourth-seeded play-in team, right? So, where do you get your four points to get you first in the group? Um, and I think this is a tougher group than people, you know, give it. So you can afford one tie, one win and one loss. Four points will probably get you through. Um you end up with two ties, then you really are in trouble to get maybe second in the group. And third in the group, I don't know how they what uh I don't know how they calculate that. They have to go like the tiebreaker down ten levels on the tiebreaker. It's gonna be the end. It it is crazy. It is a it's a laundry list. Yeah, yeah. And you know as well as I do, Bill, it's gonna happen. It's going to happen. One of the groups that's gonna happen. So, I mean, you know, I kind of tiptoed around this, but with more questions than answers. But um, I think they'll get through. I think they're I think they're gonna finish second in the group. So I think Turkey's gonna be very difficult, and and uh they'll collect more points, but I I hope I'm wrong, but um but I think they're gonna finish second in the group and go through. I don't know who they draw into number one seed in the who they draw into with the number one seed. I haven't looked at it lately. Um, as they say, Bill, if they finish second, they gotta play the games. They gotta play the games. We'll know it's the final whistle. Uh win, lose or lose or drop. Well, Bill, thank you so much for being on the GP Soccer Podcast Podcast Conversation with the coach. I really appreciate your time. Well, my pleasure, and that's really great to chat with you and glad to have the time. And it's exciting times. We're a week or so, we're two weeks away. We are indeed. We are indeed. And we're we're all gonna happen. And here I am in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and we have the Spanish national team here as their base camp. Oh, fantastic. We've got arguably the number one team in the world training and playing two games in Atlanta and one in Guadalajara. Um, so it'll be fun. And the place is upside down right now, the city getting ready for them to come in. It's exciting times, exciting times. There you go. Our guest today in the conversation with the coach on the GP Soccer Podcast has been the terrific Bill Nudall. We're gonna break for a couple of commercial messages. You know how this works. Don't you dare go anywhere, because if you do, you know what happens. I will track you down. Soccer is known around the world as both a sport and an art, with players of all ages and abilities enjoying the game. Now, the art of the game is only realized after hours of mastering ball skills, learning to communicate with your teammates, and receiving support and instruction from the right coaches. With over 100 years of coaching experience, Director John Barada and the coaching staff at the Beautiful Games Soccer Academy are pleased to offer their expertise to players and their parents. Coach Barada is one of the most decorated and accomplished soccer coaches in the Northeast with a proven track record of developing both talented players and coaches. The Beautiful Games Soccer Academy believes that success on the soccer field breeds success elsewhere in a young adult's life. Players who attend learn the importance of forming good habits, attempting new challenges without the fear of failure, and seeking out support and advice from others. The program fosters the creativity within each player and encourages them to experiment, improvise, and problem solve on the fly. At the Beautiful Game Soccer Academy, every day starts with a smile on our face and a ball at our feet. To learn more about the Beautiful Game Soccer Academy, visit www.beautifulgamesa.com. Hey, I'm Kylie Roberts. I'm the communications coordinator for the New England Revolution, and you're listening to the GP Soccer Podcast with host Giovanni Picini. And welcome to the GP Soccer Podcast, Coach's Corner, where you'll find great tips and advice on how to teach the great game of soccer. This is Giovanni Picini from the GP Sarka Podcast, and this is Coach's Corner. From Unisport, today's episode is about playing without fear. Football is supposed to be fun, but we hear about more and more young players who feel that they play extremely well in training and then don't perform at the same level in matches because they feel the pressure and are afraid of making mistakes. I've tried it myself, and if you like that as well, today I'll give you some advice on what you can do to get over fear and be more confident when you're playing football. We'll split it into two areas, mental and practical, that you can work on in order to boost that self-confidence. So make sure you subscribe and let's go. Because the worst thing you can do when you go on the pitch is to be afraid. Afraid to mess up or afraid to make the wrong decision. And who knows, maybe that even cost your team a goal. Maybe you care a lot about what other people think about you, but if you're just looking to survive when you go onto the pitch and get it over with, you make it ten times harder for yourself. Because if you play with fear, you won't go for it, won't try the dribble, won't go for the optimistic passes, and will just play a save negative game. So let's try and see how to get rid of that fear. The first thing you can do is to deal with your mistakes by accepting them. Not that you should live with screwing up, and it's great to demand a lot from yourself, but you making a few mistakes shouldn't ruin your entire game. But don't stop playing. Don't run around sulking and start making excuses because nothing good will come of that, and your teammates will most likely get annoyed and maybe shout even more at you, which in the end will only make you doubt yourself even more. Instead, you need to show yourself and your teammates that even if nothing else works, you'll fight as hard as you can for the team in order to be an asset. You can analyze your mistakes later. So forget them when you're on the pitch, buckle up and work even harder. And then it's important that you remember that you failed because you tried. You had the courage to try because you're a good player. Your self-image is extremely important because if you knock yourself down every time you make a mistake, you'll see yourself as the player who always screws up. And if you do that, how are your teammates supposed to see you any different? No. Instead see yourself as a player who's brave enough to try risky things, who's confident, and who learns from your mistakes. And finally, if you are a little insecure, be positive even when others make mistakes. It's an easy win to shift the focus onto someone else screwing up, but at the end of the day, being negative and shouting at your teammates isn't very constructive. Instead, encourage them to get back up and try again. And there's a good chance that they'll then change their tone towards you when you make mistakes as well. But there are also practical things you can do to improve your confidence. And the first thing is repetition. See, repetition creates muscle memory. You don't have to worry about tying your shoes or taking a sip of water, because you've done it a million times before. So if there are things you want to be better at, repeat them over and over and over again. Because when the time then comes, you react on instinct, and even if there's still a little bit of fear left in you, it won't have time to affect you because you've already done it. But if all this mental work and repetition hasn't quite been enough, and you're still in a match feeling a lack of confidence and a little bit of fear, you can turn to looking for a getting easy win. Set yourself a goal, whether that's nailing the next five passes, beating an opponent, win the next physical duel, or for something very specific that you can easily achieve. Because getting easy wins will build your confidence, meaning that you can focus a little more on being a good teammate, on communicating and trying more audacious stuff. Because a win is a win, no matter what. So even if they're easy wins, take them if you need to boost your confidence a bit more in the next game. So, in other words, guys, playing with fear can really cripple you as a football player. But if you remember how to deal with your mistakes well, get a better self-image, go for the easy wins, and do a ton of repetitions. I hope that you'll eliminate a bit of the fear when you play. If you have any advice or questions you want to share, let us know down below. Go get a confidence boost by getting a new fresh pair of boots from Unisboard in the league over there, and learn how to improve as a football player in the playlist down in the corner. And with those words, guys, I'll be signing off for Chew-Yo. And that's this week's Coach's Corner on the GP Soccer Podcast. I'm Giovanni Pacini. This is Soccer News and Analysis with Giovanni Pacini. From the Associated Press and the Boston Globe. Liverpool fired manager Ani Slot, following a troubled second season in charge just a year after he won the Premier League title. Fenway Sports Group, the club's American ownership, headed by John Henry, who owns the Boston Globe, said it made a difficult decision after Liverpool finished fifth and trophy less in a disappointing title defense. South Africa's national men's soccer team has postponed its travel to Mexico because of visa issues just 11 days ahead of the World Cup. Bafana Bafana was supposed to leave from Mexico to start its preparations for the tournament. The team is set to play co-host Mexico in the opening game in Mexico City on June the 11th. South African sports minister Gayton McKenzie had called the situation, quote, embarrassing, but said later on X that the team would now be departing this Monday. FIFA's on field officials for the World Cup will insist on keeping matches moving by taking rule changes designed to limit time wasting seriously, the sports governing body said with the start of the 48 team tournament less than two weeks away. There are fewer than two weeks to go before the World Cup matches kick off in Foxboro, Massachusetts, and the region is abuzz. And while there's so much to focus on, the traffic in front of South Station, the fan festival's scaffolding going up in City Hall Plaza, the watch party licenses that are allegedly arriving in days, there is lots there is a lot for immigrant communities and international visitors to consider as well. Federal immigration officials don't intend to, quote, round up immigrants en masse at the World Cup, DHS Secretary Mark Wayne Mullins said in a recent interview with CBS News. He added, however, that immigration arrests at matches aren't off the table. Immigration advocacy groups and others have raised concern about the role U.S. immigration and customs enforcement might play at an upcoming World Cup events in the world. Including at Gillette Stadium, which has been renamed Boston Stadium for the matches. Foxboro Stadium will host seven games between June thirteenth and July the ninth. Those games are expected to draw some two million visitors combined. World Cup Fever in Boston has perhaps felt more like a stubborn cold rather than a pleasant buzz of anticipation. With what seeming with seemingly endless disputes among organizers and host committees, grand promises of parties that now seem out of reach, and ticket prices so high they are turning fans away. But amid all the messy signals, someone finally scored a win for the average fan, $50 tickets with free bus service to and from the games in New York. There are 11 host cities in the U.S., including Boston and New York, scheduled to hold World Cup games in just a few weeks. But as only Boston, most storied rival has secured a dramatic deal for 1,000 tickets for New Yorkers, and only after Mayor Zorhan Mandami reportedly secured a meeting with FIFA's president to help broker the office offer. That's soccer news and analysis. Next up, Ralph Ferigno with the European Soccer Report. And as another season has drawn to an end, I thought that what we could do for the final broadcast in the GP Soccer Podcast season was take a look at how the three UEFA Cup finals went that have been contested over the last couple of weeks. So let's start off at the third tier with the UEFA Conference League final, where Crystal Palace of England defeated Rea Velicano of Spain 1-0, 1-0, 1-0 at the Red Bull Arena in Leipzig. And the Palace have made history winning their first ever major European trophy. And in fact you could say it was even greater because in their whole hundred year plus history, Palace had never won a major trophy before, and this is their third trophy in a year. The game itself was very very cagey, but the breakthrough came early in the sex sec sorry early in the second half when striker Jean-Philippe Mateta scored the decisive goal, the one that was decisive enough to secure the title for the London team. The victory served as a perfect farewell for manager Oliver Glasner, who's been behind those three trophies for Palace, and they qualified for next season's Europa League. It was also an English club that triumphed in the UEFA Europa League final with a comprehensive 3-0 victory in Istanbul for Aston Villa over the Germans Freiburg. And it ended a 30-year wait for a major trophy for Aston Villa, and it was a very, very dominant performance against Freiburg. One thing that was amazing about this was manager, Villa manager Unay Emery, extended his record in Europa League winning his fifth title. Incredible. He'd previously won the title with two Spanish clubs, Sevilla and Villarreal. As for the game itself, late in the first half was when Villa took control of the match, and two phenomenal goals capped up the first half performance. First, it was Yuri Tillemans with a thunderous volley in the 41st minute, and just moments before the halftime whistle, it was Emilio Bundia culling in a stunning shot right into the top corner to double that lead. Morgan Rogers added a third goal later in the second half, basically to tie up the game, and it was a perfect night for Aston Villa, and it earned them their first European silverware since 1982 when they won the European Cup. Finally, we had the big one, the first tier, the top tier, the UEFA Champions League final. And PSG, Paris Saint-Germain, defeated Arsenal at the Pushkas Arena in Budapest. The game after extra time was tied at 1-1, so it went to a penalty kick shootout, and the French team won 4-3. Overall, the game itself probably wasn't the greatest to watch. It was a very tense showdown, and the game got off to an early start for the Gunners of London, Arsenal Football Club, when they struck in the sixth minute with a sharp finish from Kai Havertz. After that, Arsenal tended to fall back, sit in, allowing PSG to dominate possession. But they were really struggling to break Arsenal's defensive block until with a quarter of the game left, Dembeli Equales from the penalty spot after a foul on Kavica Karaveschelia. I think Arsenal defenders were having as much problems as I have with his name. He's a great player though. Extra time was a similar pattern, and then we went to the kicks. And whilst PSG converted their kicks, unfortunately from an Arsenal perspective, Eze and Gabrielle missed sealing Arsenal's heartbreak and giving PSG a historic repeat victory. So having defended their title, there's a lot of debate about both clubs, particularly PSG as to how good they are. And since 1990, only one side has ever successfully defended their Champions League title, and that was Real Madrid, who won three in a row between 2016 and 2018. So you could say that the victory for PSG at the weekend elevates them to a new tier in the European Pantheon. I don't think a bad side has ever won the European Cup or Champions League, but it could be argued, and I think with some due cause, that only great sides have ever retained it. Arsenal pushed them a lot closer than Inter Maland did in the previous season. And maybe a shootout victory isn't quite as uh quite as satisfying, I think it's fair to say, uh, as uh beating the team over 90 or 120 minutes. But PSG do have quality, and I think the classic match of the Champions League this year was the semi-final round when PSG locked horns with Bayern Munich, and uh there was some great goals scored and two great matches, and I think that really reflects what PSG are all about. But having said that, there are a couple of things that we need to consider about them looking at the club overall, and I think one thing that's interesting is the Premier League in England has been recognized perhaps as the dominant force in European football these days, and to some extent that's true because both the second and the third tier tournaments were won by English clubs, but when you get to the really elite level of the Champions League, it becomes much more difficult for the English club to triumph. Now, PSG's players, it could be argued, are much fresher than English clubs and Arsenal especially. And looking at it specifically, uh David Raya, Declan Rice, Martin Zubamendi, Gabrielle, William Saliba, all of them played more than 2,500 minutes of league soccer this season, while there were four more Arsenal players that played more than 2,000. Compare that to PSG and they're starting a level. Only Vitinia played more than 2,000 minutes. And I think that we can take into account how much more demanding the Premier League is physically than League 1. So just to compare, the bottom three clubs in England this year, Wolves, Burnley, and West Ham, would they offer a significantly greater test to a champion team than, say, the French equivalent of Metz, Nantes, and Nice? PSG are very rich, as I think we all know. Their wage bill is double that of the next highest in France, Marseille, and more than ten times more than Le Havre, which has the lowest wage bill in the league. So you could say that their wealth has effectively destroyed the domestic uh the domestic league as a contest. And it's not just for PSG, but I think that's happening in other leagues as well. They do have a brilliant manager in Lewis Henry, and I think that that cannot be doubted or questioned. He's a superb manager, coach, tactician. Will he stay at PSG? This is going to be interesting because he does have to sign a contract. Uh sorry, a new contract. Don't be shocked if he ends up at Manchester City because they still haven't put appointed Moreska. I have a feeling that that could well happen. Comparing uh Arsenal to PSG, I think uh Mikel Arteta tactically has been very conservative, as we all know, and I think psychologically his task was to get his team over the over the line in the Premier League. Because for three seasons they've been number two, and so I think he's done whatever he feels it takes to get results this year, and it's worked. So whilst Wells people are critical of him, I think that we can understand the why. So look at the team he fielded in Budapest. Look at the players he brought on from the bench in that particular game. Timba, Zubamendi, Martinelli, Jocaraz, Eze, Madwake. So he's got a lot of depth and a lot of quality in his squad. The question for Mikel Arteta going forward is can he build upon the accomplishments of this year and now start to improve the style of the team? So that's it for the current season of the Euros Soccer Report. I'm sure you'll be tuning in to World Cup Games either on the television or here in the United States, maybe going to a game or two. That is if you have enough money. So enjoy that and I'll see you in the fall for the 26th, 27 football season over in Europe. Until then, take care. I'll see you then. Bye now. Did you know there's a place where unforgettable sports stories come to life through music? Well, there is. Music Meets Sports was created by music producer Ronald Tigolliver, an experienced music producer and a lifelong sports fanatic. He created music meets sports to fuse the raw energy of athletics with the emotional depth of music. They create custom soundtracks that not only celebrate sports fandom, but also brings the personal stories of legendary athletes to life. Through deep research and creative storytelling, music meets sports transforms the careers, the challenges, and triumphs of iconic sports figures into powerful music experiences. Every beat, lyric, and melody that is designed to reflect the heart, the hustle, and humanity behind the jersey. Now, whether you're a diehard fan or a casual sports lover, or simply someone moved by great stories, music meets sports and hopes that our music connects with you and brings you even closer to the games and the heroes that you love. Be sure to check out MusicMeets Sports app at musicmeets.org. Music Meets Sports Passion meets performance, and music brings the games to life. Hey there! Giovanni Piccini here, host of the GP Soccer Podcast, and I want to reach out to all of my great listeners who own pets and even those who don't. Listen, your local animal rescue organization is on a mission to provide loving homes for pets in need, and they need your help. Whether through adoption, fostering, or financial contributions, every bit of support counts. Join me in making a positive impact. Visit your local shelter today and help give these wonderful animals the second chance they so deserve. Together, we can create a community where every animal is cared for and loved. Hello, my name is Valerio Rocca. I'm the Academy Director for SSE 90. Uh, we're located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. We've had the pleasure of being on the GP Soccer Podcast today with host Giovanni Pacini. Yo, and welcome to the GP Soccer. And welcome back to the final block of the GP Soccer Podcasts. This is the portion of the show that we call the American Soccer Revolution, where I analyze, throw out, dump, blow up, dissect, rethink, scrap, overhaul, all things having to do with American soccer. But maybe not all things, but heck, a lot of things. I chose today to kind of put something together given the timing of the World Cup coming up in a mere 11 days. And it's about our American kids, both boys and girls, taking this wonderful opportunity to watch these great players from literally around the world do some magnificent things, not just individually, but collectively as teams as well. And, you know, some of the things I talk about here that I think are surely very, very valuable for kids to watch. So as this World Cup gets underway, it's the world's largest stage, isn't just a showcase for elite players and powerhouse nations, it's also one of the greatest classrooms young soccer players will ever have. For millions of kids across the United States, this tournament represents a rare moment when inspiration, education, and opportunity all collide. Every four years. The World Cup reminds us why this sport captures the imagination, the speed, the precision, the emotion. It's all in display. But for young players, it's more than entertainment, it's masterclass. Watching the best teams in the world is a chance to study how the game is really played at the highest level. Kids can see how defenders stay organized, how midfielders scan the field before the ball even arrives, and how forwards create space with just a subtle change of pace. They can watch how the great players move without the ball. Something coaches talk about constantly, but something that becomes crystal clear when you see it executed by the world's best. And then there's the creativity. A clever term. A perfectly weighted through ball, a goalkeeper making a save that seems to defy physics. These moments spark imagination, and imagination is often the first step toward development. But the opportunity goes beyond the highlights. Young players can learn about the rhythm of the game, when to press, when to hold, when to switch the point of attack. They can see how teams adjust tactic from one match to the next, how substitutions change the flow, and how small decisions add up to become big outcomes. For kids who truly love the sport, this is a chance to deepen their understanding in ways that no drill or training session can fully replicate. And once the final whistle blows, that's when the real magic can happen. Because the World Cup doesn't just inspire the kids to watch, it inspires them to play across the country. You'll see young players heading outside with a ball, trying to recreate what they just saw on television. Maybe it's practicing a new move. Maybe it's working on a first touch. Maybe it's just playing with friends until the sun goes down. The spark of motivation is priceless. Now, for coaches and parents, this is a moment to encourage encourage that curiosity. Ask kids what they noticed, who impressed them, what they want to try. The more they connect what they see to what they do, the faster they grow, not just as players, but as students of the game. And perhaps the biggest opportunity of all is the sense of belonging. When kids watch the World Cup, they see players from every background, every culture, every corner of the globe. They see passion, joy, heartbreak, and resilience. They see that soccer is a universal language, one they're already learning to speak. So as the World Cup kicks off, remember this for young players, it's not just a tournament, it's a window into what's possible. A chance to learn, to dream, and to take the next step on their own soccer journey. All it takes is a ball, a little space, and the willingness to try something new. The world's game is on full display, and for the next generation, the opportunity has never been greater. Well, I can't think of a better way to end the GP Soccer Podcast with those words of inspiration for all of those kids who'll be watching the upcoming tournament. So that's our show for today. If you like what you hear, please tell everyone. And remember, those likes matter, those subscribes matter, they help me, they help my sponsors. You can follow the GP Soccer Podcast all over social media, and new episodes are available every Wednesday morning. Don't forget to check out my website at GPSoccerpodcast.com. And if you're interested in advertising on the show, then email me at GP4Soccer, and that's the number four at yahoo.com. This is your host, Giovanni Pacini, and I will catch you later.