Speaker 1: Dear let you know USA listener. Before we start, you
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Speaker 1: the show. So the World Cup has come to an
Speaker 1: end after more than five weeks of all things soccer
Speaker 1: or football. It was the longest World Cup ever because
Speaker 1: more countries were added to the tournament and yes, even
Speaker 1: I found myself engrossed with several of the games. This
Speaker 1: was also the first time that the games were held
Speaker 1: across three Frankly, there were quite a few firsts this summer,
Speaker 1: which is saying something for a global competition that's been
Speaker 1: around for almost one hundred years. Here at Futuro, we've
Speaker 1: been bringing you weekly episodes of American Football, a podcast
Speaker 1: about soccer culture in the United States and it's underdog roots.
Speaker 1: Our episodes go beyond the sport to the people and
Speaker 1: the stories that make it great. It's hosted by our
Speaker 1: very own Fernanda Echavaris. For our show today, we're going
Speaker 1: to play the latest episode of American Football, which looks
Speaker 1: at the significance of this World Cup and its most
Speaker 1: controversial moments. Here it is American football.
Speaker 2: My dad was football to me.
Speaker 3: We used to watch the World Cup together, and if
Speaker 3: we weren't in the same city, we were constantly on
Speaker 3: the phone. I mentioned in the first episode of this
Speaker 3: podcast that I was feeling anxious about watching the World
Speaker 3: Cup for the first time since my dad's passing. I
Speaker 3: didn't know if the tournament would make me miss my
Speaker 3: dad more or bring me.
Speaker 2: Closer to him.
Speaker 3: Now that we've reached the end six weeks later, all
Speaker 3: I can say is that this wasn't an either or question,
Speaker 3: because both things happened. There were many instances in which
Speaker 3: I had these flashed thoughts that I could still reach
Speaker 3: from my phone and call my dad, wanting to talk
Speaker 3: about a shocking moment on the field, a confusing ref call,
Speaker 3: or a prediction in real time. My dad always picked up.
Speaker 3: He always had an answer that made sense. But this
Speaker 3: World Cup I didn't have him anymore.
Speaker 2: It hurt.
Speaker 3: I specifically remember a confusing moment in the group stage
Speaker 3: when the Qatar goalie got hit, but it ended up
Speaker 3: as a penalty against his team. So I messaged my
Speaker 3: younger sister in Mexico, the one who, unlike me, is
Speaker 3: all sports all the.
Speaker 2: Time, sarvish, who's tosta momento? It's from the lib.
Speaker 3: This is one of those moments when I would have
Speaker 3: asked Dad about this. I told her, so I need
Speaker 3: you to fill in for him. The three of us
Speaker 3: used to text a bunch during previous World Cups.
Speaker 4: Avish liouplnted.
Speaker 3: I can't remember which game I was watching when I
Speaker 3: heard an announcer on Telemundo say that this was a
Speaker 3: World Cup of nostalgia and joy. He said, and I
Speaker 3: felt that my dad had the superpower of bringing all
Speaker 3: the good vibes wherever he went, and I'm sure he
Speaker 3: would have enjoyed the hell out of this World Cup.
Speaker 3: I also wonder what he would have thought of these
Speaker 3: uh and commercial I mean hi dration breaks. What he
Speaker 3: would have said about the shameless lack of separation between
Speaker 3: politics and sport, and his take on the high tech
Speaker 3: sensors that are so sensitive they annulled a goal because
Speaker 3: of a strand of hair. Every time Mexico played, I
Speaker 3: felt my dad's absence the heaviest, but that's also when
Speaker 3: I felt closest to him. Because Mexico did incredible things
Speaker 3: this summer.
Speaker 2: I mean wow.
Speaker 3: I got to watch Mexico win at times surrounded by
Speaker 3: hundreds of green jerseys at watch parties I also hosted
Speaker 3: at home. I think I watched I want to say,
Speaker 3: eighty percent of the matches. I mean there were one
Speaker 3: hundred and four for the first time ever, so that's
Speaker 3: a lot. I watched while I work. To be fair,
Speaker 3: this was work. I streamed on my phone so I
Speaker 3: could listen while driving. I even once stepped out of
Speaker 3: a movie theater to watch penalty kicks, pacing back and
Speaker 3: forth in the theater hallway, quietly grunting like.
Speaker 2: A crazy person. I wore yellow.
Speaker 3: When I went to watch the Colombia game with my
Speaker 3: Colombian friends, I put on a red shirt and rode
Speaker 3: my butt off. In the Norway England game, I rooted
Speaker 3: for Egypt and Cabo Verde as if they were a
Speaker 3: team I had supported for years.
Speaker 2: I suffered with my favorites lost.
Speaker 5: He love you, alaa Alaimoma, Mexico, Mexico traj and.
Speaker 3: The best part of it all, the highest in a
Speaker 3: summer full of highs and lows? Was that my young
Speaker 3: daughter learned all about the World Cup? Hey kittle, Yeah,
Speaker 3: can you do me a favor? And can you tell
Speaker 3: me what is the World Cup?
Speaker 5: The World Cup is special everything. I just want to
Speaker 5: say God and we go like yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.
Speaker 2: And also the people.
Speaker 5: Who played before soccer it's great. Shakita, oh eh.
Speaker 2: Of course she loves Shakida, she's my daughter. Do you
Speaker 2: know why the World Cup is so important to me?
Speaker 5: I just know why it is because you not watched it.
Speaker 5: So he likes soccer, So you like soccer. You've growed
Speaker 5: up being liking soccer.
Speaker 2: That's true. Actually, can I tell you what my favorite
Speaker 2: part of the World Cup was?
Speaker 6: My favorite part of it?
Speaker 2: But you don't know what my favorite part of the
Speaker 2: World Cup is?
Speaker 6: I do you do?
Speaker 5: It's really special to you because you haven't seen the
Speaker 5: World Cup.
Speaker 3: With me and this is the first time we get
Speaker 3: to watch together. Do you know how happy that made
Speaker 3: me to have you wearing the mix?
Speaker 5: Really happy, really happy, really happy. And my favorite part
Speaker 5: was that everybody was together.
Speaker 2: Honestly, it did feel like everybody was together.
Speaker 3: I love the nods that I got when I wore
Speaker 3: my Mexico jersey out in daily life. I love that
Speaker 3: we all rooted for all the countries our friends are from,
Speaker 3: that we laughed and stressed and meaned together in every
Speaker 3: group chat. And yes, most of all, I loved passing
Speaker 3: on the ritual of watching it all with my daughter,
Speaker 3: just like my dad watched with me. I'm Fernanda Chavarri
Speaker 3: and this is American Footboard, a show about soccer culture
Speaker 3: in the US and it's underdog roots. Today the end,
Speaker 3: I sit down with a soccer expert and super fan
Speaker 3: to discuss this World Cup significance, the few firsts, which
Speaker 3: is saying something for a global competition that's been around
Speaker 3: almost one hundred years. We'll talk about the most controversial moments,
Speaker 3: and of course about Spain's journey to the coveted trophy.
Speaker 3: I am now joined again by Jasmine Gars. She covered
Speaker 3: the World Cup friend PR, where she's also an immigration
Speaker 3: correspondent and you and I. Jasmin also worked together on
Speaker 3: a podcast Last World Cup about MESSI called The Last Cup.
Speaker 3: So Jasmine, thank you so much for.
Speaker 6: Being here, Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2: You know, this has been you could call it a
Speaker 2: lot of things.
Speaker 3: This has been an electrifying World Cup, to say the least,
Speaker 3: and so much has happened on and off the field.
Speaker 3: But let's work our way backwards and start with some
Speaker 3: of your thoughts about how the final unfolded. Spain won
Speaker 3: Argentina zero. I have to say I had Spain winning
Speaker 3: it all in my bracket. I think I might have
Speaker 3: told you this earlier, and I think that the second
Speaker 3: half show does that Spain truly earned that trophy. Was
Speaker 3: this the end that you expected, Jasmine?
Speaker 4: I'm going to say something controversial, which is that I
Speaker 4: didn't think that was a very exciting game. I can
Speaker 4: name off the top of my head, like five more
Speaker 4: electrifying games that I watched.
Speaker 3: Starting with the game that happened the day before. Yeah,
Speaker 3: totally much more exciting. Part of that is because Spain
Speaker 3: dominated so hard. It was almost like there was only
Speaker 3: one team on the pitch. It reminded me of that phrase.
Speaker 4: I think it's like from Batman, when an unstoppable force
Speaker 4: meets an unmovable object. I mean, like Spain is on
Speaker 4: another level. Their defense was completely impenetrable.
Speaker 6: Argentina kind of fell apart.
Speaker 4: By the end of the game, Spain had done twenty
Speaker 4: attempts at a goal, one of which ended up being
Speaker 4: a goal, and Argentina had done two.
Speaker 2: That's crazy.
Speaker 6: That's how good the defense was.
Speaker 4: And I think Argentina made them work for it, but
Speaker 4: Spain was the better team and they absolutely deserve that win.
Speaker 6: Were extraordinary.
Speaker 3: I have to bring up the picture that's gone viral,
Speaker 3: the one of twenty year old learn and Messi bathing
Speaker 3: baby Lamin Yamal, because first of all, this is like destiny.
Speaker 3: I mean in all of the things that I saw
Speaker 3: about he's nineteen and they're nineteen years apart, and this
Speaker 3: is being played on the.
Speaker 2: Nineteenth and the number nineteen.
Speaker 3: So can we talk about that photo please?
Speaker 6: Yes.
Speaker 4: The origin story of that is a raffle put together
Speaker 4: by like a local newspaper and in conjunction with UNISEF,
Speaker 4: several families got to take their newborn to meet the player,
Speaker 4: and so Lamina Mal's parents take him to meet Messi,
Speaker 4: and I think it was like a beautiful passing of
Speaker 4: the torch. I think people love to focus on the rivalry,
Speaker 4: but I think, you know, Messi has expressed a huge
Speaker 4: admiration for Lamina Mal, and Lamina Mal is an extraordinary
Speaker 4: player who is like kind of entering his stardom, and
Speaker 4: Messi is slowing down right like this is actually expected
Speaker 4: to be his last Cup, but he's going to be
Speaker 4: in his forties in the next Cup. That photo is
Speaker 4: really like a sort of almost like biblical Star Wars,
Speaker 4: the and paving of the torch. I also think like
Speaker 4: I was talking to a fan before the game, a
Speaker 4: young guy who was saying to me, well, no matter
Speaker 4: what I win, because I'm a huge Barsa fan. And
Speaker 4: really on that field it was to some degree like
Speaker 4: a Barsa reunion, and it speaks a lot to the
Speaker 4: Barsa system and the Spanish soccer system, and how like extraordinary.
Speaker 2: It is a system that formed Le Messi.
Speaker 6: And La Minama.
Speaker 4: It is the academy. And I think what we saw
Speaker 4: on that field is that.
Speaker 3: You know, La Minyama didn't have many goals or that
Speaker 3: many assists, but he played an essential role in Spain's
Speaker 3: offensive strategy throughout. What does he represent for the future
Speaker 3: of soccer in this new upcoming era that you know,
Speaker 3: perhaps four years from now we will have a World
Speaker 3: Cup without Ronaldo and without Messi.
Speaker 6: It's a changing of the guard.
Speaker 4: When I see La mignaml I see someone who is
Speaker 4: just like fierce and hungry and needs a little bit
Speaker 4: of like sharpening. He's nineteen, of course he needs sharpening.
Speaker 4: Of course, when Messi was nineteen, he needed sharpening. But
Speaker 4: it's so exciting. I didn't really get to see Messi's
Speaker 4: beginnings because you know, we're sort of in the same
Speaker 4: age bracket. But to get to see like the birth
Speaker 4: of a legend that is so exciting.
Speaker 3: Yes, I want to talk a little bit about how
Speaker 3: the World Cup felt. You and I throughout we're texting
Speaker 3: about a few things, and this was a World Cup
Speaker 3: that felt a little bit of mare recognized to me.
Speaker 2: Oh, yes, you know commercialized.
Speaker 3: Yes, it's always been driven by and profit and corporations.
Speaker 3: But there was something about that halftime show, the hydration breaks.
Speaker 3: So you're making already gestures with your hands, tell me
Speaker 3: your thoughts.
Speaker 4: Yes, I really wanted to talk to you about the
Speaker 4: halftime show, So hydration breaks.
Speaker 6: I've let it go. Oh because I've been there.
Speaker 3: Because you needed the hydration break. And how many stadiums
Speaker 3: did you go to? At least six and you were
Speaker 3: sweating at all of them?
Speaker 6: Oh it was bad. Yeah, like the heat has been
Speaker 6: really bad.
Speaker 4: You know, even with the hydration breaks, you're seeing players cramp.
Speaker 4: I'm not saying, for the record, I'm not saying I
Speaker 4: agree with the hydration breaks, but I can see an
Speaker 4: argument for it. But that halftime show as a soccer
Speaker 4: fan really irked me.
Speaker 2: Tell me why, because there's a natural.
Speaker 4: Flow to soccer in which you go, go, go, go,
Speaker 4: and depending on what team you are, you're either winning
Speaker 4: and you need to cement it quick, or you're losing
Speaker 4: and you need to stage a comeback quick, and you
Speaker 4: got about fifteen minutes to think about how you're going
Speaker 4: to do one of the two. Soccer is a frenetic sport.
Speaker 4: Soccer is anxietyness for like ninety minutes, maybe one hundred
Speaker 4: and twenty, and it lost that like it was thirty
Speaker 4: minutes the halftime, Yeah, was around the amount of time
Speaker 4: of an entire first half, and I felt like it
Speaker 4: really lost the flow and that franticness of soccer.
Speaker 3: See that's how I felt about hydration breaks, especially when
Speaker 3: a team was really getting its groove and then hydration break,
Speaker 3: Like what, No, don't stop soccer, You don't stop this.
Speaker 3: I hear what you're saying about you being in the
Speaker 3: stadium and understanding why the hydration breaks were needed, but
Speaker 3: I felt, in a smaller way how you felt about
Speaker 3: the halftime show.
Speaker 6: Yeah, tell me how you felt about the halftime show.
Speaker 3: I thought it was a little strange, And the strangest
Speaker 3: part of it all was like Justin Bieber showing up
Speaker 3: as a sort of like the drunk guy at the
Speaker 3: party that decides to pull out an acoustic guitar at
Speaker 3: two am and brings the whole vibe down and you're like, mijoh, no.
Speaker 2: Listen, I love a show. Yeah, but I did think
Speaker 2: it was long.
Speaker 3: I think they should have just done maybe one artist.
Speaker 3: And I'm also understanding that it's crazy to ask, you know,
Speaker 3: the soccer field to become a sort of stage and
Speaker 3: a spectacle in a very short amount of time.
Speaker 2: But I do think it was too long.
Speaker 4: I joked to someone that, like, Argentina has only been
Speaker 4: playing well in the second half, and now they're going
Speaker 4: to like think this is a first half again.
Speaker 3: And yeah, resting for that long is like when you're
Speaker 3: at a wedding and you're wearing really tight shoes or
Speaker 3: uncomfortable shoes and you take them off for a second,
Speaker 3: you can't put them back on.
Speaker 6: Like you can't.
Speaker 3: You got to just like power through it. And that's
Speaker 3: how I felt about that.
Speaker 6: I love that analogy. Well, that's a great analogy.
Speaker 3: After the break, we get into some of the biggest
Speaker 3: controversies surrounding the tournament and the underdog team that captured
Speaker 3: all of our hearts.
Speaker 4: Ola.
Speaker 7: So it's just Canada, Rivera, It's just passio and it's
Speaker 7: the podcast story is a kiness Oia and trona penitencia
Speaker 7: and personal.
Speaker 6: Penitencia.
Speaker 7: Can a persona covet the la scucha penitencia and call
Speaker 7: calata for my podcast.
Speaker 3: This is American Football. I'm Fernando Chavari. Let's get back
Speaker 3: to my conversation with reporters Jasmine Gars. You know the
Speaker 3: three host countries, Mexico, the US, and Canada. Sorry Canada,
Speaker 3: there's so much more to talk about when it comes
Speaker 3: to the US in Mexico. Yeah, I love you Canada,
Speaker 3: but you know, one the US, this is the first
Speaker 3: time that one of the host countries is actively at
Speaker 3: war with one of the participating countries. And we really
Speaker 3: saw sort of a contrast on how to be a
Speaker 3: good host. So I think Mexico showed that and we
Speaker 3: had so many videos of the reception of the Iranian
Speaker 3: team last minute and just how people felt being in
Speaker 3: Mexico and felt welcomed by Mexican fans and just Mexico
Speaker 3: in general. And then on top of that, you have
Speaker 3: the US with this controversial red card situation. How would
Speaker 3: you explain the red card situation and why was that
Speaker 3: so meaningful?
Speaker 4: So the US, you know, like superstar Fuller and Balagun
Speaker 4: gets a red card and he's their star. This is
Speaker 4: going to be a huge problem moving forward. And then
Speaker 4: President Trump says like he publicly says that he called
Speaker 4: FIFA and said.
Speaker 6: You know, this was not a fair call.
Speaker 4: We know that President Trump and FIFA President Johnny and
Speaker 4: Fandino have been seen together, They've expressed a closeness. So
Speaker 4: it was really seen as like the US government interfering
Speaker 4: in that red call, and FIFA effectively removed the red
Speaker 4: card annulled it. And then you know, the US goes
Speaker 4: on to lose tremendously against Belgium, which I think there
Speaker 4: was like some kind of psychological thing happening too.
Speaker 6: Even though Belgium's are a good team.
Speaker 3: It had to have done something to them, especially you know,
Speaker 3: I don't know how online they are. I hope that
Speaker 3: the players are not online during the World Cup much.
Speaker 3: But I mean there was also all of this it's
Speaker 3: got the Trump touch. Now they're going to lose. Yeah,
Speaker 3: it had to have effect at the players, and I
Speaker 3: think that US fans also didn't think that was a
Speaker 3: great thing for how they look to the world.
Speaker 4: It really really FIFA corruption, which has been an ongoing
Speaker 4: accusation here.
Speaker 6: And it also just, you know, like we're at this
Speaker 6: moment in the US.
Speaker 4: In which there's these conversations about tatalitarianism and the overreach
Speaker 4: of this government. And it was this moment in which
Speaker 4: we were jolted out of the World Cup fantasy and
Speaker 4: back into like world reality.
Speaker 6: I think that's what it was like. It for a moment,
Speaker 6: the illusion was shattered.
Speaker 3: Every World Cup has an underdog that's a crisis or
Speaker 3: a few underdogs, and I think in this World Cup
Speaker 3: that team was. They played their first World Cup ever
Speaker 3: and they won everyone's hearts. So what would you say
Speaker 3: made them such a special team to watch throughout this
Speaker 3: World Cup?
Speaker 6: I started off telling you that this final.
Speaker 4: You know, I can think off the top of my
Speaker 4: head of you know, five other games we've seen in
Speaker 4: this Championship that are more electrifying, and a lot of
Speaker 4: those games are with cave Verd. Gabo Verde was stunning.
Speaker 4: They were defensively, they were a wall. I do think
Speaker 4: there's this narrative that they kind of came out of nowhere.
Speaker 4: Certainly this was their first World Cup that they qualified for,
Speaker 4: but Gaba Vedade for the last like ten years or
Speaker 4: so has been playing extraordinary soccer in the African Championships.
Speaker 6: They didn't quite come out of nowhere.
Speaker 4: And I think, you know, something I've been saying throughout
Speaker 4: this tournament is like African soccer had a huge moment,
Speaker 4: and I predict in twenty thirty it's going to be
Speaker 4: just a tournament where we just see African soccer completely
Speaker 4: like bloom on the world stage.
Speaker 6: And the indication I have of that is gabl abdebe.
Speaker 2: I mean, there's no doubt about that. We saw so
Speaker 2: many teams play beautiful games.
Speaker 3: Yes, this World Cup. I want to talk about some
Speaker 3: of the less fun things of this World Cup. You know,
Speaker 3: we had already talked about FIFA in interfering in the
Speaker 3: US with the red card. Yeah, what were some of
Speaker 3: the controversies that stood out to you the most.
Speaker 6: I think the red card controversy was huge.
Speaker 4: I think the treatment of Iranian players, Like we're so
Speaker 4: far removed from that moment now that I don't think
Speaker 4: people are talking about it a lot. But like the
Speaker 4: Iranian team was being forced to shuttle back and forth
Speaker 4: from Tijuana to you know, wherever they were playing after
Speaker 4: every game. I mean it was like they had an
Speaker 4: added four hour commute back and forth because they weren't
Speaker 4: allowed to stay in the US because of the conflict
Speaker 4: right now.
Speaker 6: It was putting this team through exhaustion.
Speaker 4: I think VAR was hugely controversial, hugely controversial, And I
Speaker 4: think the VR question goes beyond like soccer. I think
Speaker 4: like it's really tapping into this larger question we're having
Speaker 4: in society right now about technology.
Speaker 6: At what point does technology help? At what point does
Speaker 6: it hint?
Speaker 4: And if technology is ultimately being handled and decided by humans,
Speaker 4: how unbiased can it really be? You know, because the
Speaker 4: ref is deciding ultimately, there's a human behind the VAR.
Speaker 4: And I think also like rumors or so many rumors
Speaker 4: of FIFA and Leo Messi and like Argentina and was
Speaker 4: it fixed the infamous Argentina Egypt game. What I think
Speaker 4: about that, I think FIFA protects its stars like FIFA
Speaker 4: protects its money makers, you know, like Pifa's there to
Speaker 4: make money. And I think FIFA does go more lenient
Speaker 4: on m Babe, on Ronaldo, on Messi because they're the
Speaker 4: big ticket salespeople.
Speaker 6: They're the stars. Do I think the game was rigged?
Speaker 4: Well, I think if it was, it wasn't done so
Speaker 4: very successfully. To me, A personal controversy was Mexico England,
Speaker 4: because I think Mexico played so well I know, and
Speaker 4: deserved to win that game. And I will say those
Speaker 4: of us who watch soccer all the time know that
Speaker 4: there is a degree of skill and a huge amount
Speaker 4: of merit and who works the hardest, but sometimes it's
Speaker 4: just dumb luck.
Speaker 3: Coming up, we wrap up our conversation talking about some
Speaker 3: of the historic firsts of the tournament and the biggest
Speaker 3: storylines that won this World Cup. That's after the break.
Speaker 3: This is American football, am Fernanda Charvari. Let's wrap up
Speaker 3: my conversation with Jasmine Cars. You know, we've mentioned some
Speaker 3: firsts in this World Cup, and I don't want us
Speaker 3: to rap without mentioning that we had the first match
Speaker 3: ever with an all women referee. Trio Mexico became the
Speaker 3: first country to host for the third time, and then
Speaker 3: this was the first time that we had forty eight
Speaker 3: teams instead of thirty two. What are your thoughts now
Speaker 3: on having wrapped a World Cup that was a little
Speaker 3: longer with more teams.
Speaker 4: I'm on the fence about it because if it hadn't
Speaker 4: been that way, we might not have seen gabovet if
Speaker 4: it hadn't been like so inclusive. Now I'm they have
Speaker 4: a new fan in me same. I do think it
Speaker 4: was a little too long this World Cup. It felt
Speaker 4: like towards the end I started getting world cupped out again.
Speaker 4: It might be because I've been traveling to like three
Speaker 4: different cities every week.
Speaker 6: How did you feel about this?
Speaker 3: I loved having a longer World Cup. I will say
Speaker 3: that because more games just it's just more fun for me.
Speaker 3: But what about the FIFA president Janni and Fantino saying
Speaker 3: that he opening up the possibility of sixty four teams
Speaker 3: in the Men's World Cup in the future.
Speaker 2: Now that that'd be too much?
Speaker 4: I mean, I think there's also something to say about
Speaker 4: the wear and tear on the players towards the end.
Speaker 6: We were seeing teams being very worn out.
Speaker 2: You know, this was really a World Cup of stories.
Speaker 3: And in the very first episode of the series, I
Speaker 3: asked a soccer expert what makes a good World Cup?
Speaker 3: And he said, the stories, Yes, the football, but also
Speaker 3: the stories. What do you think is one big story
Speaker 3: that will stay with you from.
Speaker 2: This World Cup?
Speaker 4: I hate to be repetitive, but Cape Verd, every match
Speaker 4: they played felt like a David and Goliath. To me,
Speaker 4: the match between Argentina and Cape Verd, I will remember
Speaker 4: that game my whole life. I think it was one
Speaker 4: of the most extraordinary matches I've ever seen, to the
Speaker 4: point where to the last minute I did not know
Speaker 4: who was gonna win.
Speaker 6: I had two.
Speaker 4: Articles ready to publish, wow, because I had no idea
Speaker 4: what was going to happen. And I think, to me,
Speaker 4: like that was one of the big stories, Like this
Speaker 4: David that kept putting the brakes on all the Goliaths.
Speaker 6: I mean, Spain couldn't beat them, you know.
Speaker 4: And I think also like probably the sort of passing
Speaker 4: of the torch between Messi and La Mio is another one.
Speaker 2: It's a beautiful story.
Speaker 6: It's a beautiful story, you know.
Speaker 4: I think it's also, like, despite a lot of the
Speaker 4: online narrative about you know, messy and like, you know
Speaker 4: the reality of like some bad sportsmanship that we've seen
Speaker 4: on the field while everyone else was kind of misbehaving,
Speaker 4: those two showed us what real athleticism and being a
Speaker 4: winner means.
Speaker 3: And now the thing is, are all the moms gonna
Speaker 3: want to have MESSI give their babies a bath to
Speaker 3: pass that? Thank you, Messy Magic, Please just give my
Speaker 3: baby a bath, Massy.
Speaker 6: What's Matthew's next incardination? Dou La.
Speaker 3: Jasmine Gars, thank you so much for speaking with us
Speaker 3: and for chatting with me again.
Speaker 6: Thank you for having me. I love this show.
Speaker 1: That was an episode of American Football, a podcast about
Speaker 1: US soccer culture from our very own Futuro Studios. Make
Speaker 1: sure to go to the American Football podcast feed and subscribe.
Speaker 1: You can also find a link in this episode description
Speaker 1: and remember it's American Football f Utbol.
Speaker 3: American Football is produced by Futuro Studios in collaboration with Iheart's.
Speaker 2: Michael Dura podcast Network. I'm your host Fernande Charvai.
Speaker 3: This episode was produced by andres Caabajerro and Levi Sharp,
Speaker 3: Rebecca Evarra is our senior editor who also did the
Speaker 3: fact checking mixing by Julia Caruso.
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Speaker 8: Latino USA is made possible in part by the Melon Foundation.
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