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I was five years old when I first heard the word “soccer.” My best friend and I were changing into our fresh-out-of-the-box uniforms in his Mom’s station wagon, and I figured that the name of this sport we were about to try must have something to do with the long purple socks that we were trying to pull on over what we’d just learned were called shin guards. A year later, once I’d learned to spell, I was baffled to see that the name of my favorite sport wasn’t “socker.” And so, the first soccer game I ever saw was the first game I played in. I probably scored a goal, too. I usually did. Not to brag, but as a five-year-old kid on the sun-scorched fields of North Texas, wearing a perforated purple jersey that hung down to my knees, I was an absolute menace in front of goal. This was in the mid-seventies, in the middle of the big US soccer boom. The original North American Soccer League had just formed. I was a Dallas Tornado fan. I saw them play the New York Cosmos with Pelé and Beckenbauer in the squad. I had a poster of Kyle Rote, Jr., on my wall. It seemed like every kid in America was playing soccer, even the girls. And the best of those little girls, who grew up playing right alongside the boys, went on to form the incredibly dominant first generation of the US women’s national soccer team. I enjoy thinking that I had something to do with that. That’s how it started for me, and I haven’t stopped playing, watching, and loving soccer since. But that’s just me—oh, and about a gazillion other people around the world, and even one or two hundred in the United States. That’s a joke. Despite the running gag that “Amuricans hate soccer,” there are plenty of soccer fans in America, and most of us don’t care whether you want to join us or not. Just don’t tell us that soccer is boring because, believe it or not, that’s not a very interesting thing to say. For the rest of you, the interested and interesting folks out there who might not know much about the game but want to enjoy it a little more during this World Cup, here are a few tips. | 
