Speaker 1: The US and men's national team took to the pitch
Speaker 1: in a World Cup game on American soil, and boy
Speaker 1: it was.
Speaker 2: Worth the way. During the twenty twenty six World Cup,
Speaker 2: the US men's national team started off with an impressive
Speaker 2: four to one victory over Paraguay.
Speaker 3: The US men started their World Cup run strong with
Speaker 3: a goal in the first seven minutes epic, memorable, amazing.
Speaker 1: The largest margin of victory in the World Cup for
Speaker 1: the US since nineteen thirty, that was when the first
Speaker 1: World Cup was held.
Speaker 2: It was their inagural game as hosts, and they played
Speaker 2: spectacularly in front of their fans.
Speaker 4: I'm not an expert when it comes to soccer or anything,
Speaker 4: but I just watched Team USA and the World Cup
Speaker 4: absolutely destroyed Paraguay.
Speaker 5: Is the USA good at soccer now?
Speaker 2: They made it out of their group in first place,
Speaker 2: won the first knockout match, and as they've done so
Speaker 2: in previous World Cups, they qualified for the round of sixteen.
Speaker 2: But then Belgium came and they were eliminated in a
Speaker 2: humiliating four to one defeat.
Speaker 1: It was a heartbreaking in to Team USA's World Cup
Speaker 1: journey as fans watched their team fall to Belgium four
Speaker 1: to one in the round of sixteen Monday.
Speaker 2: Night, and the press, the fans, everybody had an opinion.
Speaker 3: So happy that we're in top sixteen, but then we
Speaker 3: could have done way better.
Speaker 5: I don't know what happened.
Speaker 6: We just gave up.
Speaker 3: This team was down in the game, and he never
Speaker 3: felt like they were gonna come back. It's almost as
Speaker 3: if they were just accepting the fact that, you know what,
Speaker 3: it just isn't our night and we're just gonna move on.
Speaker 2: No, no, don't accept it. Fight it.
Speaker 3: They just looked outclassed and outstaged, if you will. It
Speaker 3: was too much pressure for him.
Speaker 2: That last voice is Daniel Wetzel. He's a senior writer
Speaker 2: at ESPN, where he covers all sorts of sports, including soccer.
Speaker 3: The Americans kind of shrunk in the big game where
Speaker 3: you watched other teams that weren't as good lose Mexico, Egypt,
Speaker 3: but they fought superior opponents, you know, extremely hard, and
Speaker 3: that wasn't there in the Americans.
Speaker 2: And after the high of winning and the low of
Speaker 2: getting eliminated, people like Dan are reckoning with a post
Speaker 2: mortem on the men's team and trying to make sense
Speaker 2: of what happened.
Speaker 3: In a lot of both technical and tactical ways. It's
Speaker 3: an improved team over the last twenty years, but at
Speaker 3: the end of the day, the result is the same.
Speaker 2: From Futuro Studios, I'm Fernando Chavarri and this is our
Speaker 2: last episode of American Football, a show about soccer culture
Speaker 2: in the US and its underdog roots. So today we're
Speaker 2: going to look into the questions that many Americans have
Speaker 2: asked at the end of previous World Cups.
Speaker 4: What will it take for.
Speaker 2: The US to compete with the elite teams in the future.
Speaker 2: What needs to change to take US and soccer to
Speaker 2: the next level. For Dan at ESPN and many other experts,
Speaker 2: part of the problem stems from the way that youth
Speaker 2: development is run in this country, starting with amateur leagues.
Speaker 3: The developmental system in the United States is fundamentally different
Speaker 3: than every other country. The US system. The players that
Speaker 3: are in it, generally speaking, are from a socioeconomic background
Speaker 3: middle class to wealthy, and they also geographically live in
Speaker 3: the suburban rings around major cities. They get the best training,
Speaker 3: the best resources put into them, the best pitches and fields,
Speaker 3: and the most attention and basically the United States, which
Speaker 3: has three hundred and forty million people, so there's still
Speaker 3: plenty of people to create good teams, but they are
Speaker 3: ignoring all of the talent that exists inside of the
Speaker 3: major cities or in the rural parts of the country.
Speaker 2: The system Dan is referring to is also known as
Speaker 2: pay to play. It essentially means families have to dish
Speaker 2: out hundreds or thousands of dollars every year so that
Speaker 2: their kids can play at amateur leagues or club teams.
Speaker 2: This ultimately translates into more visibility for a chance to
Speaker 2: get a college scholarship or to pursue a professional career.
Speaker 2: Now we're talking specifically about the men's site here, So
Speaker 2: once players turn thirteen, the most talented teenage boys could
Speaker 2: be invited to join an academy run by Major League
Speaker 2: Soccer or by one of the pro league teams. So
Speaker 2: to play at the highest level in amateur club teams,
Speaker 2: parents need to be able to afford what is known
Speaker 2: as travel soccer so that they can attend the tournaments
Speaker 2: happening throughout the year.
Speaker 3: You have to have the money to travel to games.
Speaker 2: Besides covering this issue for ESPN, Dan raised two girls
Speaker 2: who played travel soccer, so he knows what it's like
Speaker 2: to be one of those parents bouncing around from one
Speaker 2: tournament to another and spending lots of money.
Speaker 3: You have to have parents who are able to drive
Speaker 3: you to practices, drive you to out of town games,
Speaker 3: and so that we just cut out a huge portion
Speaker 3: of our country that doesn't have access to soccer and
Speaker 3: instead will play a different type of sport.
Speaker 2: To be fair, there are parents in other countries who
Speaker 2: also pay for their kids to play soccer, but the
Speaker 2: costs here in the United States are far greater. And
Speaker 2: I should also mention that here in the US, youth basketball, football,
Speaker 2: or baseball can also get pretty costly for parents. They're
Speaker 2: all part of what experts see as an unregulated amateur
Speaker 2: sports landscape. But unlike these other popular sports dominated by
Speaker 2: the US, the pay to play model with youth soccer
Speaker 2: becomes a problem because soccer is a global sport. The
Speaker 2: US is competing with players from other countries, and it
Speaker 2: lags behind Europe and Latin America, where youth development is cheaper,
Speaker 2: often subsidized by the government or professional teams, and frankly
Speaker 2: more effective. And Dan says that the impact of the
Speaker 2: current pay to play. System doesn't stop.
Speaker 3: There when you are paying a coach a club. Right
Speaker 3: when I'm paying the relationship between a coach and a
Speaker 3: player is no longer mentor and mentee coach player. It's
Speaker 3: coach to customer. I'm paying your salary, I'm paying your
Speaker 3: club to exist. How hard can you really coach me?
Speaker 3: How hard can you teach me? Particularly mentally?
Speaker 2: Dan says, this all business approach to youth soccer kind
Speaker 2: of gets in the way of real player development.
Speaker 3: The clubs as a business succeed by winning, and to
Speaker 3: win at age nine to ten, you sometimes have to
Speaker 3: play the kid that grew faster and is stronger or
Speaker 3: faster at the time, and you're just kicking through balls
Speaker 3: and this one kid is running down the field and
Speaker 3: they're running in and scoring, and we win the tournament
Speaker 3: and it seems like we have the best development. That
Speaker 3: kid may not really have any potential. There's another kid
Speaker 3: that you can see maybe at eight nine and go,
Speaker 3: that kid's got fision or his technical skills really look
Speaker 3: like they could be something else. But you can't play
Speaker 3: him because well, he hasn't grown yet. And so that
Speaker 3: kid kind of gets pushed down because the motivation of
Speaker 3: the club is to win, so the pressure to win
Speaker 3: at eight, nine to ten overrides coaching, development and really
Speaker 3: playing the kids that have the long term future. So
Speaker 3: there's a disconnect between are we creating the best players
Speaker 3: in the country so that we can develop pros and
Speaker 3: World Cup champions or are we just trying to make
Speaker 3: the most money this year.
Speaker 2: See in places like Europe and Latin America, promising young
Speaker 2: players not only get access to academies without the financial
Speaker 2: burden parents have here in the US, but they also
Speaker 2: get better physical, technical, and character focused development starting at
Speaker 2: a young age. Dan says that also the US doesn't
Speaker 2: have as many professional teams in every small town or
Speaker 2: even in larger cities, so the for profit amateur clubs
Speaker 2: here end up filling that gap. And we know that
Speaker 2: while European or Latin American systems are imperfect, I mean
Speaker 2: they do sell star players to bigger teams for profit,
Speaker 2: at least they ensure that more youth with potential have
Speaker 2: proper development and visibility.
Speaker 3: In terms of developing great players, I don't believe there's
Speaker 3: a lot of talent just going through the net in Argentina,
Speaker 3: let alone Germany and England and France.
Speaker 2: That's also why Dan thinks that despite having a population
Speaker 2: of three hundred and forty million people, the US is
Speaker 2: still importing so much of its talent. Den isn't the
Speaker 2: only one out there the alarm about the current pay
Speaker 2: to play system. Many others have been doing so for years,
Speaker 2: like former US national team star Landon Donovan, who said
Speaker 2: this during an interview with CNBC Sport.
Speaker 5: It's a complete disaster. It is greedy, it is winning first.
Speaker 5: The players are the last thing on anyone's mind. The kids.
Speaker 5: It's really disgusting. I've now seen it twice with my
Speaker 5: own kids. I've always been passionate about it, but it's
Speaker 5: really triggered me and that will be my next frontier
Speaker 5: and moving quickly on, meaning how do we build a
Speaker 5: league that's not so obsessed with winning at such a
Speaker 5: young age, not a league, a sport.
Speaker 2: Completely Restructuring youth soccer in the US is a huge undertaking,
Speaker 2: especially when so many people depend on it to make
Speaker 2: a living or a big profit. But according to experts,
Speaker 2: it has to start somewhere and soon.
Speaker 3: I think if there could be a clear path to
Speaker 3: development and extend more opportunities into the city more into
Speaker 3: the rural areas, try to make it a little more affordable,
Speaker 3: and just try to take away some of the confusion.
Speaker 3: So there's a lot of work to do. The US
Speaker 3: has certain benefits, got a ton of money, it's got
Speaker 3: a ton of people, and it's a nation of immigrants.
Speaker 3: So the US is going to keep getting better, almost
Speaker 3: by accident.
Speaker 2: After the break, an insider's perspective about the current state
Speaker 2: of US youth soccer development. I speak with Alfonso Mondelo.
Speaker 2: He's the Technical Director of Competition for Major League Soccer,
Speaker 2: and we look into what the MLS is doing to
Speaker 2: help take US men's soccer to the next level internationally.
Speaker 6: I think we're seeing because young as four and five
Speaker 6: beginning to play. So perhaps the big difference is the culture.
Speaker 6: You know, in other countries, you breathe, you live soccer more.
Speaker 2: When we come back, we're back with American Football am
Speaker 2: Fernando Chavarri. Let's get into where US men's soccer stands
Speaker 2: today and the role that Major League Soccer plays in
Speaker 2: developing young players. To talk about this, I sat down
Speaker 2: with Alfonso Mandelo. He's the Technical director of Competition from
Speaker 2: Major League Soccer. He's originally from Spain, but he has
Speaker 2: spent most of his life playing and coaching here in
Speaker 2: the US, and he has more than two decades of
Speaker 2: experience as an insider working with MLS. Before we start
Speaker 2: talking about this summer's World Cup, I'm curious, what would
Speaker 2: you say is different that you've seen between US born
Speaker 2: players and players the rest of the world. I'm talking
Speaker 2: younger kids who are not at the professional level yet,
Speaker 2: but who are seeing soccer as a possibility.
Speaker 6: I think the big difference is in most of the
Speaker 6: countries around the world, soccer has been the predominant sport,
Speaker 6: and when a young kid begins to take his first
Speaker 6: steps and kicks the first ball and he sees the
Speaker 6: first professional game, they dream about being professional. I don't
Speaker 6: think that that was the case in the early pace
Speaker 6: of youth playing here in the United States, where soccer
Speaker 6: was being seen as a way to get a college scholarship.
Speaker 6: Kids played and the parents invested in the kids' soccer
Speaker 6: education with the hopes that they would obtain a college scholarship.
Speaker 2: Since the US was eliminated from the twenty twenty six
Speaker 2: World Cup after a four to one defeat to Belgium,
Speaker 2: many people who care about the US national team have
Speaker 2: been trying to sort of understand why the US maybe
Speaker 2: didn't go farther as a host country, and especially because
Speaker 2: they started out strong. So what is your take on
Speaker 2: the u U performance this summer?
Speaker 6: Well, the early rounds of the tournaments, particularly the first game,
Speaker 6: it was probably the best that we've seen a US
Speaker 6: national team play. Everything seemed to have come together, the players,
Speaker 6: the style of play, and there was a groundswell and
Speaker 6: a following for the US team, and that continued until
Speaker 6: the game against Belgium. But also in a tournament like this,
Speaker 6: you can't have a bad day, and a bad day
Speaker 6: your opponents punish you, and I think that that's what
Speaker 6: happened with the game against Belgium. It was a shadow
Speaker 6: of the way that the team had played in the
Speaker 6: previous matches, and when you try to react and you're
Speaker 6: done by a couple of goals, it becomes very difficult.
Speaker 6: So overall, I think is positive, but I think we
Speaker 6: all expected the US team to go a little bit further.
Speaker 6: So what began really well in a little bit of
Speaker 6: disappointment towards the end.
Speaker 2: I know people love to talk about what could have
Speaker 2: been done differently, or question why the US struggles when
Speaker 2: they face somebody like Belgium or France in Spain, which,
Speaker 2: to be frank a lot of people were shaking our
Speaker 2: boots went faced with those teams and what their history represents.
Speaker 2: Where do you think the US national team stands today
Speaker 2: in international soccer in general?
Speaker 6: The last few years, I think the US team has
Speaker 6: improved quite a bit, given the fact that most of
Speaker 6: the players are now playing in top of the leagues
Speaker 6: around the world. We have players that are playing in
Speaker 6: Champions League caliber teams, so they're gaining that type of
Speaker 6: experience that they're bringing together when they come to the
Speaker 6: national team. So that gap has clearly narrowed, but we
Speaker 6: still have a bits to go.
Speaker 2: Where does MLS stand today if we were to compare
Speaker 2: them to leagues in Europe and Latin America?
Speaker 6: Wow, I think MLS has been an unbelievable success story.
Speaker 6: I mean, when you think about it, we're thirty one
Speaker 6: years into this league. When the league started in nineteen
Speaker 6: ninety six, we began with ten teams. There was number
Speaker 6: one soccer specific stadium in the United States. And now
Speaker 6: we're looking thirty one years later and we have thirty teams.
Speaker 6: Across North America, United States and Canada, where there's in
Speaker 6: about twenty six stadiums that are soccer specific. Clearly, the
Speaker 6: goal right now is to become the best league in
Speaker 6: Concacat in our region. And we certainly have the older
Speaker 6: brother in Mexico that has been there for a long time,
Speaker 6: and there has been a well established league and very
Speaker 6: successful league. But I do think that the gap has narrowed.
Speaker 6: The quality of our league becomes stronger with every passing year.
Speaker 6: So it's a really a league that's on the rise,
Speaker 6: and I would say at this point now it's got
Speaker 6: to be among the top ten leagues in the world.
Speaker 2: You started talking about seeing so many different young players
Speaker 2: come up the ranks throughout the decades that you've been
Speaker 2: involved with soccer in the United States. But you know,
Speaker 2: some of the criticism that we've heard is that there
Speaker 2: need to be some changes to the pipeline in the
Speaker 2: United States when we talk about the future of soccer here.
Speaker 2: So what role do you think that Major League Soccer,
Speaker 2: the MLS and other leagues play in sort of maybe
Speaker 2: taking this to the next level.
Speaker 6: The one positive step is that for now for the
Speaker 6: MLS clubs is no longer pay to play, So players
Speaker 6: that are being selected into the academy so of MLS. Now,
Speaker 6: these are players who really are being focused and being
Speaker 6: groomed to be future professionals. Clearly, not everyone can be
Speaker 6: a professional, and there will still be players that will
Speaker 6: end up going through the college pathway. But I think
Speaker 6: it's important that when you have the top level talent
Speaker 6: available in an environment where they're competing day in and
Speaker 6: day out, and they're being pushed towards that goal of
Speaker 6: becoming top level professionals, this is where we're going to
Speaker 6: see the next wave of American players continue to improve.
Speaker 2: And just because I'm not in the weed so much
Speaker 2: the pay to play you're saying it's being addressed now,
Speaker 2: it's been sort of addressed already. Is it in the works?
Speaker 2: What's the current state of that.
Speaker 6: No, I think that's a very difficult subject to tackle.
Speaker 6: I think that pay to play is here, and I
Speaker 6: don't think it's going on go away. I think that
Speaker 6: there are a lot of people who are living off
Speaker 6: of soccer. Parents still want to invest the soccer education
Speaker 6: of their children. The country is so vast that not
Speaker 6: everyone can have access to a MLS club, so it
Speaker 6: will continue. What we hope is that this would become
Speaker 6: a final and the filtering of those top level players
Speaker 6: that can get moved on quicker and quicker into programs
Speaker 6: that will help them to be identified as potential players
Speaker 6: and then be in an environment that will help them
Speaker 6: to grow. This is a major major issue for US Soccer.
Speaker 6: MLS can only do their part by continuing to develop
Speaker 6: those players and continuing to improve the quality of our game.
Speaker 6: And there's a separation between US Soccer Federation and MLS.
Speaker 6: The US the Federation looks out for the good of
Speaker 6: the game as a whole, and MLS is looking to
Speaker 6: develop players for the highest level.
Speaker 2: Can you tell me a little more about the MLS academies?
Speaker 6: Sure, the academies. When the league started, none of the
Speaker 6: MLS club had a player development initiative in place. And
Speaker 6: it's been probably the last fourteen to fifteen years where
Speaker 6: there's been an investment made into giving North American players
Speaker 6: a place to develop as professionals. So since then, now
Speaker 6: most of our clubs are going as young as you
Speaker 6: twelve and you thirteens, So there is a whole pathway
Speaker 6: of going from a young player who's dreaming about being
Speaker 6: a player into becoming a pro. The last step that
Speaker 6: has been taken by MLS I think four years ago
Speaker 6: where we created MLS Next Pro and this is a
Speaker 6: chance for the clubs to have a second team, sort
Speaker 6: of a reserve team where the young players that are
Speaker 6: coming out from the academy have that final step to
Speaker 6: become a profession. The goal is in the near future
Speaker 6: to have the North American players become the main stage
Speaker 6: and then continually to bring the top starts from the
Speaker 6: rest of the world.
Speaker 2: And how early are these efforts starting age wise?
Speaker 6: I think we're seeing because young at four and five
Speaker 6: beginning to play. But perhaps the big difference is the culture.
Speaker 6: You know, in other countries, you breathe, you live soccer,
Speaker 6: Your parents talk about soccer at home, you see soccer
Speaker 6: on TV. You really don't get away from it. And
Speaker 6: here there's still other sports. There's other distractions in soccer.
Speaker 6: Especially at the youngest level, it's in activity. They go
Speaker 6: to soccer on Tuesdays and then they go to piano
Speaker 6: lessons and they go to baseball and they play other sports.
Speaker 6: Perhaps that, but when it gets to like the ten,
Speaker 6: eleven and twelve years of age, those kids in other
Speaker 6: countries are really full time focus on soccer, and this
Speaker 6: is what they do. They train with their teams. When
Speaker 6: they're not training with their teams, they're going off and
Speaker 6: playing with their friends, and soccer is really first and foremost,
Speaker 6: and I think the emphasis on developing their technical and
Speaker 6: tactical abilities are much more enhands and focused at a
Speaker 6: younger age than perhaps we're doing here, and that certainly
Speaker 6: could be a drawback.
Speaker 2: After the break, winning versus real development.
Speaker 6: So you're winning, but are you developing anybody there more?
Speaker 2: When we come back, we're back with American Football. Am
Speaker 2: Fernande Chavarri. Let's wrap up my conversation with Alfonso Mandelo,
Speaker 2: technical director of Competition from Major League Soccer. At this
Speaker 2: point in our interview, I wanted to ask him about
Speaker 2: something that former US soccer star Landon Donovan had brought
Speaker 2: up his point about the win now culture and the
Speaker 2: pressure that puts on youth. You know, I want to
Speaker 2: ask you about something that Donovan has brought up about
Speaker 2: the win now culture or the pressure on youth and
Speaker 2: emphasis on winning.
Speaker 5: My next frontier. This will be by far the most
Speaker 5: important thing I do in this sport is tackling youth soccer.
Speaker 5: It's very clear for me how you fix this, but
Speaker 5: nobody's done it because the incentive structure is backwards and
Speaker 5: winning is what's rewarded for the coaches, for the players,
Speaker 5: for the parents, for the club, and we need to
Speaker 5: change that. And by the way, it's not a coincidence
Speaker 5: that we're not producing world class players the way other
Speaker 5: countries are.
Speaker 2: When I first sort of thought about this, I was like, well,
Speaker 2: doesn't everyone want to win? Doesn't the coach in the
Speaker 2: team in what hear to Mexico want to push for
Speaker 2: the same thing. So it's not really just a US problem.
Speaker 2: But how relevant do you think this is in terms
Speaker 2: of the future of the US.
Speaker 6: Winning is part of competing, and I think anybody who
Speaker 6: steps on the field wants to win. Yeah, but it's
Speaker 6: how you win. Are you winning developing players or are
Speaker 6: you just winning to win the title where you know
Speaker 6: you have a big, strong kid in the front, you
Speaker 6: kick the a and the big kid scores a lot
Speaker 6: of goals. Yeah, so you're winning, but are you developing
Speaker 6: anybody there? And I think that the difference with the
Speaker 6: top clubs in Mexico or Spain or Holland or Germany
Speaker 6: or whatever. They're looking to win playing well developing players
Speaker 6: that will have a future that will be well rounded.
Speaker 6: But I think sometimes winning at the lower ages can
Speaker 6: mask a lot of things in hide the deficiencies that
Speaker 6: some of these players are having in the development.
Speaker 2: This really is giving me so much pause. I have
Speaker 2: a young kid thinking about when they go into sports
Speaker 2: like this, how much of that is seen on like
Speaker 2: a Saturday to Saturday game.
Speaker 6: You know. Yeah. Unfortunately, sometimes, especially at the younger age groups,
Speaker 6: winning is more important for the parents than for the kids,
Speaker 6: and the pressure that those parents are putting the kids
Speaker 6: to win, but not to do things right. So I
Speaker 6: think that that's major step that has to be overcome.
Speaker 6: Parents are parents, and they always want the best for
Speaker 6: their kids, but sometimes there's too much pressure and not
Speaker 6: enough worry on are they developing, are they growing? Are
Speaker 6: they getting better? Are they in an environment that's really
Speaker 6: helping them to become better? Unfortunately, what we see sometimes
Speaker 6: in American soccer what we call the flavor of the week.
Speaker 6: They go from one team to the other because this
Speaker 6: team is recruiting better players, but they think that this
Speaker 6: is the better environment from them, and they bounce from
Speaker 6: one club to another, or one coach to another without
Speaker 6: really worrying about how the player is developing. Are the
Speaker 6: right steps being followed to develop the player into a complete,
Speaker 6: well rounded athlete. That's a major REACHIOND that has to
Speaker 6: be overcome.
Speaker 2: As somebody who has never coached one single game of
Speaker 2: football in my life, it makes sense that you want
Speaker 2: to start with the youth to sort of grow a
Speaker 2: new generation of talent. But besides development, what do you
Speaker 2: see as the big need moving forward to get you
Speaker 2: as soccer to the.
Speaker 6: Next level culture? The culture of the sport has to
Speaker 6: continue to grow, and the players are playing with pressure
Speaker 6: all the time, so that pressure becomes normal and becomes
Speaker 6: something that you deal with. So first developing the technical,
Speaker 6: the tactical, learning the game, but then learning to deal
Speaker 6: with external pressures. Still we don't have that in this
Speaker 6: country from a very young age. So that also forges
Speaker 6: a mental fortitude and attitude that our players still need
Speaker 6: in this country. Since the arrival of Major League Soccer
Speaker 6: and the creation of soccer academies, I think now young
Speaker 6: players who dream of being professionals have a pathway. Now
Speaker 6: the thought of being professionals is becoming on a par
Speaker 6: like what it is in the rest of the world,
Speaker 6: with kids wanting to some day fulfill their dreams.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for your time, my pleasure. It
Speaker 2: was really wonderful speaking with you.
Speaker 6: Thank you for.
Speaker 2: While the pay to play system and youth soccer may
Speaker 2: not be the only thing keeping the US men's national
Speaker 2: team from getting far at World Cups, it's clearly something
Speaker 2: that demands more attention. True, this revamping youth development in
Speaker 2: the US is a monumental task and it will take time.
Speaker 2: But whether it means sports analysts sounding the alarm or
Speaker 2: the MLS creating more academies, the hopeful part is people
Speaker 2: are talking about it and trying to change things. And
Speaker 2: I think that after the summer, more Americans than ever
Speaker 2: before will be anxiously waiting for four more years until
Speaker 2: their next shot at World Cup.
Speaker 4: Glory.
Speaker 2: American Football is produced by Futuro Studios in collaboration with
Speaker 2: Iheart's Michael Dura podcast network I'm Your host Fernande Charvari.
Speaker 2: Episode was produced by Andrescavadero with additional production by Levi Sharp.
Speaker 2: Rebecca Evarra is our senior editor, fact checking by Roxanna Guire,
Speaker 2: mixing by Brandon Krugel at Multitude Productions. Legal review by
Speaker 2: Jonathan Fisher at Fisher Legal Arts. Victoria Strada is our
Speaker 2: production manager. Our executive producers are Marlon Bishop and Maria
Speaker 2: Garcia at Futuro Studios. Executive producers at iHeart are Leo
Speaker 2: Gomes and Arlene Santana. Futuro Media was founded by Maria
Speaker 2: no Josa. This is our last episode in the series,
Speaker 2: but if you want to go back and listen to others,
Speaker 2: you can find us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast,
Speaker 2: or wherever you get your shows. Thanks for listening.