7 Reasons to Look Forward to the USA Playing in the Next World Cup ...

The USA in the World Cup played great this year under their coach Jurgen Klinsmann’s guidance, who gallantly led the USA out of the so-called “Group of Death”! Klinsmann was brought in to lead the USA because of his promise to instill an attacking style and technical progress that he had with his German experience at Bayern Munich. He was given a four-year extension to his contract last year meaning that he will likely select the next squad for the 2018 World Cup! Although there is still some work to be done and more progress to be made, I think watching this team evolve will be a good enough reason to want to watch them play in 2018.

The patriotic following and hearing slogans and chants like “I Believe That We Will Win,” whenever the USA plays is another reason to watch the US play again. I love how fans really get behind their team! Stemming from England, the chants are sung when a player does something fantastic on the pitch, when the players need a pick-me-up and sometimes they’re sung to slight the opposing team. Still, just seeing the banners, hearing the chants, the way the fans dress up and sport their patriotism definitely instills a lot of confidence in me that the next World Cup tournament will be just as great as this one was.

I love finding out who a team like the USA will be playing against, which group they fall into, and which other countries qualified (it’s tough to make it to the World Cup stage). Since the US national team doesn’t have the same history or traditions like Italy, France, Germany and England that play regularly on the international circuit, they’re not given the same credit when it comes to playing or even qualifying. The fact though that the US were able to prove the world wrong and break out of their group, shows that hopefully the next World Cup will be just as riveting and one to watch!

Knowing that some of the US national team is composed of a squad of talented players commanding millions of dollars working for some of the most sought after football clubs in the world (i.e., the English Premier League or German Bundesliga), makes it that much more special when the individual superstars come together and play as a team. Tim Howard currently plays for the English Football Club (FC), Everton, Jozy Altidore plays for another English FC, Sunderland, Michael Bradley plays for Toronto FC, part of the Major League Soccer (MLS), and so on. It’s always fun to know that these players frequently collide and compete with each other during a regular football season, and then they come together and play as a unit for their country, their national team.

A host of tickets were bought at the World Cup 2014 tournament by American fans; in fact the USA was the second largest market after Brazil, this tournament's host country. When I read this fact, I was taken aback, but then again, I wasn’t too surprised due to the fact that Americans have one of the largest disposable incomes. Only a handful of countries have higher per capita incomes when it comes to money matters, according to The World Bank. Also, the USA is pretty populated compared to countries like Holland or Greece, therefore, if even only 5% of the USA’s population wants to watch football, that’s still a lot of people buying tickets.

Deciding who to play and what formations the coach and coaching staff will make is always fascinating to me! Whether the coach will choose a 4-4-1-1, 4-4-2 or other formations will make the next World Cup exciting. Different play formations are used by different teams, depending on who the striker is, as well as other factors. It’ll be interesting to see which country adopts which formation and how it helps them win.

The uniqueness of each tournament means that anything can happen at any given moment and within any match. Clearly you can’t re-live a match or be certain of a specific end-result, but we certainly saw injuries in this World Cup, what with Clint Dempsey’s broken nose and Jozy Altidore’s left hamstring injury, both occurring in the same first match against Ghana! Not that I’m saying this is a reason to look forward to the USA playing, but it definitely changes any team’s dynamics and mixes things up a bit, giving the substitutes a chance of glory on the pitch!

The big chance comes for the US national team once every four years, so it's anyone's guess right now who will be playing on the team and which countries they will face. Some players are at their peak right now, some are maturing and some have fresh legs, but I'm confident Klinsmann will get the best of the best on the squad. Are you looking forward to the USA playing in the next World Cup tournament?

Source: Guardian.com
CBS Sports
USA Today
FIFA.com