4.8 • 5.8K Ratings
🗓️ 24 May 2018
⏱️ 3 minutes
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Long before Men in Blazers, Roger Bennett was just a kid growing up in Liverpool with contradictory obsessions: soccer and America. He moved to the U.S. just in time to witness the sudden rise of the U.S. men's national team in the early 1990s. Now, Rog is teaming up with WNYC Studios to tell the tale of that team's ill-fated mission at the 1998 World Cup. Told through candid interviews with the team, it's a story for soccer fans and non-fans alike.
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0:00.0 | I'm Roger Bennett. I was born in Liverpool as a kid, I read poems, watch soccer and devoured |
0:07.6 | all the American TV I could find. |
0:10.8 | Starski in Hutch, the A-Team, I studied the love boat as if it was a religious text. |
0:17.0 | Gray up in England, I dreamed about America. When I wasn't reading Philip Larkin, the |
0:22.0 | Gen 2 surely deserves his own podcast, a worship Ferris Bueller, the Michael Jordan, had |
0:27.5 | a poster of the Chicago Bears and Debbie Gibson on my bedroom wall. I always knew I'd |
0:32.5 | get to America, I just didn't know when. |
0:37.2 | So in 1993, I moved to Chicago, and to say I struggled at first would be a serious |
0:43.3 | understatement. I tried to remember what my dad used to tell me, and what he still tells |
0:49.6 | me. |
0:50.6 | Well, you never know in life what's coming along. I have been saying that about Everton |
0:56.5 | for years, you have to look forward. |
0:59.2 | So, my dad's talking about my local soccer team, Everton. He talks about them a lot, because |
1:04.6 | in Liverpool, two things rain supreme, music and soccer. |
1:10.6 | My grandpa is an Evertonian, I am an Evertonian. It's a remarkable way to live life. You manage |
1:16.8 | expectations, you don't. |
1:19.5 | I saw my first Everton game at age 7, and I've taken each of my children to their first |
1:23.9 | game when they turn the same age. I love watching soccer, take me into the team meeting, |
1:29.2 | writing about soccer, thinking about soccer, and then that pressure affects your heart. |
1:33.8 | It allows me to feel human emotions, and actually numb to in real life. |
1:37.8 | So is it a nervy time? You know, happiness, misery, hope and hopelessness? Do you feel |
1:43.8 | dominant? |
... |
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