1990 MISL ALL-STAR GAME : Newman’s Cup Runs Over With Challenge for National Team

Ron Newman gets worked up when the subject is soccer, particularly World Cup soccer. Sometimes, when he gets worked up, his tongue gets lost somewhere between his cheek and reality.

Finding himself surrounded by Major Indoor Soccer League All-Stars at a Tuesday luncheon, Newman got worked up.

Having already coached six of these affairs, you would think he might be a little blase. Except this one is different. This one, for the first time, is at home in San Diego.

Newman has never been one to sidestep a soap box, and here was one on his doorstep.

Thirty-two players, representing the eight MISL teams, will participate in this 11th annual all-star game at the Sports Arena.

However, it is Newman’s notion that they should represent a lot more than their MISL teams.

He would like to see them represent the United States in the World Cup, at least the ones with U.S. citizenship.

“The best American players are in the Major Indoor Soccer League,” Newman said. “The most professional players. The most competitive players. The most finely tuned players.”

But those aren’t the players the U.S. will send to Italy this year for World Cup play. It is, of course, a matter of opinion whether these players are, in fact, the best players in the U.S., but Newman has never been shy about expressing his opinion.

Given that there is a chance these are the best players in the U.S., in that case making Newman’s opinion reality, we then stumble across a bit of tongue-in-cheek fantasy.

You see, Newman has this idea.

“I’d like to take the best MISL players and challenge the National Team,” he said. “Best of three games. Winner goes to the World Cup. You think they’d take that on?”

He had that mischievous twinkle in his eye that told you he knew and you knew the answer to the question. Sure, the National Team would jump at the opportunity to play against the MISL and take a chance on not being the National Team any more, just like Buster Douglas can’t wait to get back into a ring with Mike Tyson. The difference is that Douglas will eventually have to . . . but make a few million in the process.

What nettles Newman, to be sure, is any suggestion that the best indoor players are in any way inferior to outdoor players.

“You know, I’ve never heard indoor soccer players with anything bad to say about the outdoor game,” he said, “but I can’t say the reverse is true. Outdoor players don’t know the fine points of the indoor game and resent it because they don’t understand it. They fear what they don’t know.”

The point should not be lost that the best indoor players did not grow up playing in barns or phone booths. The best indoor players learned the game outdoors, most of them excelling at the outdoor game. However, should one care to make a living as a soccer player in this section of the New World, it better be indoors.

That being the case, it would appear that the best players hereabouts must be the ones playing the Americanized indoor version of the world’s favorite sport.

Newman, having made his statement of opinion and then ventured wildly into the fantasy land of a challenge match, was ready to roll onward.

“With the National Team,” he said, “you have to take the players playing in the most competitive league available. You have to get them where they are trying to win a place on a team or win a game or win a ball. I don’t think (our National Team) has the best players and they’re not playing in the most competitive atmosphere.”

If Newman had not been right, it would be tempting to say that all of his bluster was a means of building up the caliber of players who will be appearing in the All-Star game.

But he was right.

The best soccer players in the United States will be the ones at the Sports Arena tonight, albeit this is not an occasion to bring out intense competitiveness. An All-Star game in indoor soccer is like an All-Star game in anything else, which is to say a free-lance showcase for individual skills.

However, if these guys were meshed onto one team, I would like their chances in a challenge match against the incumbent National Team.

Just because it will never happen doesn’t mean it shouldn’t.