When the United States reached the quarter-finals of the World Cup in 2002, American soccer fans had good reason to celebrate. For the past hundred years they had been more used to humiliating failures from the national team, the repeated collapse of starry-eyed plans for a nationwide league and the contempt of mainstream sports devotees, who derided soccer as dull, tame and un-American a game for commie pansies. Yet the neglected story of American soccer's long struggle is a rich and surprising one. David Wangerin traces its path from the brief promise of the 1920s, through the euphoric highs and extravagant follies of the NASL, to today's hard-won acceptance.
