The 2009 edition of the Confederations Cup is now over, and the surprise story from this past month of action has been the United States of America. Bob Bradley’s young and talented team shocked the world by progressing from the tournament’s group of death, and did one further by upsetting Spain 2-0 in the semifinals.

After their disappointing 3-2 loss to Brazil in the final, the stars of the American team are attracting previously unattainable attention. Jozy Altidore, the 19 year old striker, was one of the surprise packages of the USA’s…

This past weekend saw one of the most exciting and dramatic ends to group action in an international tournament. While Group A was dominated by Spain, Group B was dominated by drama and action.

Spain and South Africa progressed out of Group A, while it’s Brazil and the United States of America coming out of Group B. The USA began the weekend at the bottom of their group, but a convincing 3-0 win by Brazil coupled with a shock 3-0 win for the US over Egypt meant Italy and the Egyptians were…

The United States miraculously scraped into the Confederations Cup semifinals this past weekend, and their fixture against Spain is one of the USA’s biggest matches since the 2002 World Cup. For one of the United States players, it represents a chance for him to break onto the international scene and impress his club teammates.

Jozy Altidore, the shining star of the United States, knows that he’s coming up against some of the best players in the world. He plies his trade in La Liga for Villareal, and now he’s ready to beat…

Football is a funny game - this is the sport where anything, and I mean anything, can happen completely out of the blue. For example, no one ever imagined that Brazilian star Ronaldinho, who was literally unstoppable not too long ago, would suddenly become as anonymous as he is nowadays.

Stories like those of Ronaldinho, however, are not as uncommon as some of us might think. My last article was devoted to underdogs and fittingly enough, this article is devoted to uncovering the stories of some of football’s greatest underachievers. For those who have listened…

Before I wind up any Americans reading this, let me preface this by saying that I too am American. Just as much as any other American, I’d love to see the United States become a footballing powerhouse. We’ve certainly got the numbers - 300,000,000 citizens - and the melting pot effect means we’ve got people from all walks of life (Brazilian, English, Italian, etc.). For some reason, though, that has never produced any great players (and even when we do, such as Giuseppe Rossi, they decide to play for another national…

Cinderella stories happen everyday, everywhere in this world. In particular, when it comes to the world of football, we have seen quite a few of them. After all, who would have thought that Senegal would knock France out of the World Cup in 2002? Or who would have picked Greece to win it all in the European Cup of 2004? Most recently, no one even imagined a devastated Iraq to lift the Asian Cup.

I often argue with the few soccer buddies I have over here in the U.S. that there is…