USA

143 entrants predicted USA to win the World Cup

1327 entrants are supporting USA

Top 10 USA supporters

Pos	Name	Po
1	Vaidas Karnickas Lithuania	106
2	Alex Bush  Lexington	104
3	Jeff Meyer   United States	103
3	Darren Dennis Coggeshall	103
5	Colleen  USA	100
6	Mark Adkins USA	99
7	Bill USA	98
7	Mad Mike 666 Playin on the Moon	98
7	Recluse Indiana	98
10	Krikor   London	97

Group matches

Team profile

• Coach: Bruce Arena, 1998-
• World Cup appearances: 8
• First World Cup: 1930
• Best performance at World Cup: Third place, 1930

The United States men's national soccer team is the national association football team of the United States and is controlled by the United States Soccer Federation.

History

The United States is a side that enjoyed early competitive success but is only now beginning to regain its international status. In the 1930 World Cup, the Americans won the first match in World Cup history (3-0 over Belgium in Montevideo, Uruguay-occurring simultaneously with another "first game" across town where France defeated Mexico). American player Bert Patenaude then scored the first hat-trick in World Cup history as the U.S. defeated Paraguay, 3-0.

In that first Cup, USA advanced to the semifinals, finishing in third place, still the all-time best World Cup performance by the men's team. Some British football historians have claimed that the U.S. team at that competition was loaded with "ringers" (non-native players) from British professional leagues. The facts do not support that assertion.

In the 1950 World Cup, the U.S. team pulled off one of the greatest upsets in soccer history, handing England its first ever World Cup defeat 1-0, after England had recently beaten the rest of Europe 6-1 in an exhibition match. Some news agencies in England reported the match result as 10-1 to England, a result which would perhaps have been less surprising. However, the U.S. failed to advance from group play after losing to Spain, and would not qualify for another World Cup until 1990. Although they were dismissed from that tournament without making a point, the side rebounded to win the first ever CONCACAF Gold Cup in 1991.

The team's best performances at recent World Cups have been a second-round appearance in 1994, when it hosted the event, and a quarterfinal berth in 2002. They were one of the major surprises at the 2002 event, stunning highly fancied Portugal 3-2 in group play, defeating continental rivals Mexico 2-0 in the second round, and narrowly losing to Germany in the quarterfinals 1-0.

For about a decade before the 2002 World Cup, the U.S. men's team existed largely in the shadow of the country's high-profile women's team (a fact that made them an object of derision by fans of other established men's sports like baseball, American football and basketball). While the U.S. men have not totally escaped the women's shadow, they are now receiving more attention from soccer fans at home. The U.S. men are now a highly competitive side, capable of playing with and often defeating top teams from the rest of the world. In recent years, USA has become known for producing goalkeepers; three U.S. keepers started in the English Premier League in the 2003-04 season. Two of the three combined to win back-to-back Goalkeeper of the Year awards, as voted by the players, with Brad Friedel in 2002-03 and Tim Howard in 2003-04.

Since its recent successes, the team has been consistently ranked in the top 15 of the FIFA World Rankings; its highest-ever rank was 4th, first obtained in April 2006. More Americans than ever now have successful careers in European leagues, and the country's youth team is strong, as shown by the under-19s winning the 2005 Milk Cup.

The USA has had more men reach 100 caps (international appearances) than any other country, with eight to date.

On September 3, 2005, they qualified for their 8th World Cup by beating Mexico 2-0 in Columbus, Ohio. The United States was drawn for Group E in the World Cup, and will face Italy, Ghana, and the Czech Republic in the group stage. Because of the high FIFA ranking of the sides in Group E, it has been frequently called this Cup's group of death. Adding to the difficulty, the lucky second qualifier of this group is likely to face first-ranked Brazil in the following round.

World Cup record

• 1930 - Semifinals (no 3rd place match)
• 1934 - Round 1
• 1938 - Withdrew
• 1950 - Round 1
• 1954 to 1986 - Did not qualify
• 1990 - Round 1
• 1994 - Round 2
• 1998 - Round 1
• 2002 - Quarterfinals
• 2006 - Qualified

Encyclopedia information from Wikipedia article 'USA national football team'. Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled GNU Free Documentation License.