Watching the Copa América Opener

The good and bad of seeing Argentina win a soccer game with my wife and kids.

I have made a half-dozen attempts to write this column since Saturday morning, with each version either worse or more pessimistic than the last. It’s now mid-afternoon on Sunday, my daughter is watching Gabby’s Dollhouse on the couch outside my office, and I’ve got about an hour and fifteen minutes before the middle boy climbs out of his crib and comes looking for me.

So here goes.

On Thursday, I traveled with Haley, Alba (4), and Enzo (2) to see Argentina’s men’s soccer team open the Copa América against Canada in Atlanta. Half of you don’t watch, play, or care about soccer, so I won’t bore you with an explanation of the tournament’s significance to international soccer or why it’s being played in the United States rather than South America, where it’s traditionally held. Only know that the last time I saw the Argentinian national team play was in the final of this same tournament in 2016. Then, they lost on penalties to Chile and Lionel Messi briefly retired, citing the pain of suffering a third straight loss in the final of an important tournament (the 2014 World Cup and 2015 Copa América being the others) for why he had to step aside.

Today, the situation of Argentina’s national team, which I’ve been obsessed with since I was five years old, is a 180-degree turn from what it was in 2016. So when another Copa América was announced for the U.S., with the opening game being played in Atlanta, a four-hour drive from Knoxville, I knew I had to buy tickets. I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t give my daughter, who is just a year younger than I was when my love for the beautiful game was born, the chance to see the defending Copa América, Finalissima, and world champions—the country of her forebears—play a game so close to home.

The tickets were expensive, as are most for sporting events in this country, where spectators are treated more like customers than real fans. I paid $1,100 for four seats in the upper deck near midfield. Thanks to the DVD player in the minivan, which usually has either Dora the Explorer, PAW Patrol, or Bob the Builder on for the kids, we made the drive without stopping and parked a 7-minute walk from Mercedes-Benz Stadium (foreign readers, you will note that in the U.S. every professional sports stadium is named after a corporation or wealthy person, not for a member of the community or someone who has contributed to the sport being played or club/team being represented). Before going in, Haley painted the kids’ faces with blue-and-white hearts and the pattern of the Argentinian flag.

When I asked them all later what their favorite parts of the game were, Alba said getting her face painted and Enzo said Messi (though I doubt he remembers anything and is merely parroting me). Haley said watching the kids clap and Alba singing along to “Muchachos” after Argentina’s goals.

If they had asked me back, I would’ve said winning and being with them. Then I would’ve read out a long list of complaints about the atmosphere, which was hollow, and the number of attendees—the majority wearing Messi jerseys, though very few of either Argentinian or Canadian heritage—watching the game through their cell phones instead of with their eyeballs. I would’ve said to Haley—I probably did say at some point—“This is why I watch games on TV alone.” Because too many people don’t understand how important this is. They don’t respect the players or the effort they’re making to defend their flags and families. They—we—have become cogs in a machine that is turning the purest game in the world into a plaything for billionaires attended by celebrities and wannabe influencers with enough disposable income to buy tickets so they can post on social media.

In Argentina, the fans are called la hinchada, the noun form of a word that means “to swell up.” Cheering is called aliento, the noun form of a word that means “breath.” I love these translations, just as I love that the word for dribbling in my parents’ country is gambeta, a reference to a swift and unexpected movement from the tango (gamba is the Lunfardo word for leg). The expectation when you attend a game in Argentina—just like in Uruguay, Brazil, or just about any nation that qualifies for the World Cup—is that 90% of the people in attendance will be dancing, singing, throwing smoke bombs, waving flags, or chewing their fingernails until their hands are a bloody mess from the stress of watching a team they love in battle.

I could go on about this forever, but that wouldn’t help anyone. I’m writing this not to complain but because I know that I need to get better at ignoring all of the things that prevent me from finding joy in life or compel me to ruin the moods of the people who love me and aren’t as annoyed by capitalism, consumerism, and all the other isms that turn human beings into dollar bills or worse.

I need to get better at shutting out the noise.

I was very fortunate to see Argentina and Messi in person again before he retires. I got to share this special experience with three of the people I love most in the world. This time, unlike the others, Argentina won. Messi was exquisite. And the game was action-packed, with two goals and many more that could’ve been for either side (on another day, the game might’ve finished 5-2).  It’s possible this may be a foundational memory for Alba as she gets older and, hopefully, learns to love soccer as much as I do (or, at the very least, as much as her mother does).

I wish my experience of live sports wasn’t ruined by people around me not behaving exactly as I want them to. And while the complacency may be annoying, I know that in countries where the passion for this sport is turned up to 11, there are racist chants, terrible abuse of players, and awful language that makes reasonable people squirm and leave their kids at home.

I could rattle off many ways I’d improve the experience of soccer in the U.S. if I were in charge. The list includes firing Alexi Lalas, playing competitive games exclusively on natural grass and in soccer-specific stadiums, gutting the pay-to-play youth system, eliminating all non-local business sponsorships and ads, and sending the vast majority of English and European-born coaches back home where they can’t bleed naïve American parents for $5-10,000 a year so their kids can play Division III soccer.

But I’ve promised God, my wife, and my therapist that I will try to be more positive. So I will fight back with love instead of hate.

While I vowed for years to raise my kids to represent the U.S. or Argentine national teams in a World Cup, I’d be happy for them to love the game, watch it with me on TV or in stadiums where I can teach them the right way to do things, and play AYSO.

I’ll wrap it up by saying that I’m grateful to have given my family a memory we will recount alongside Argentina’s World Cup victory in 2022. Even though I’d vote in favor of cell phones being banned from stadiums, I’m grateful that Haley captured photos and videos of Enzo jumping up and down like the Energizer Bunny, clapping like a madman, and Alba smiling big and doing her best to follow along as I explained what was happening on the field to her. I’ll remember her putting up her fingers to show the “1” and “0”—Messi’s No. 10 jersey. I’ll remember ripping her up into the sky after Julian Alvarez’s opening goal and her screams of fear turning into joy as she realized I wasn’t going to drop her.

I’ll probably watch Argentina’s next two games at home so that I can focus as a bookish college student would to an important lecture from a favorite professor. I’m more willing to watch the U.S. in a bar (we watched the 2-nil win versus Bolivia last night at Schulz Brau with friends) as this tournament holds less significance for the Stars and Stripes. But I may keep Alba up, as Haley and I did during the Women’s World Cup last year, seeing as she’ll be our first to venture into the waters of competitive soccer in the next years. She’ll need memories and role models.

If you haven’t been tuning into the Euros or the Copa América, put a game on TV. The best part of the American tournament is that it’s also being broadcast on TUDN, so you don’t have to listen to Lalas or Carli Lloyd on Fox.

I’ll be back soon with something more coherent.

This column may be on hiatus for two to three weeks while I finish up the fourth and final chapter of my Paddlehands saga and work on my novel. I’ll continue to write to members of The Attic Club, which you can join for as little as $4.17/month.