PHILADELPHIA -- In between the first and second games of his club's preseason tour through North America, Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson complained about the lack of a winter break during the English Premier League season."Most Decembers we play between eight and nine games at the worst time of the year. The pitches are heavier, the weather is worse and then in the second half of the season you'll find a lot of players at all clubs carrying strains, pulls, but because of the importance of the games, they keep on playing," he said.
"And then when they get to the end of the season and have a major tournament like a World Cup or European Championship they are not 100% fit. They can't be. They need that rest factor which brings the energy back into the system. Germany always takes that month-long break in January and they always seem to do better in World Cups than anyone ever expects." Sir Alex may be on to something.
England, of course, crashed and burned in South Africa, winning only one of its four games. And the four teams that advanced to the World Cup semifinals? They featured a combined eight players (out of 92) from the world's most famous and revered league. Among them were Spain's Fernando Torres (Liverpool), who was more of an impediment than an asset on La Roja's road to the title, and Holland's Robin van Persie (Arsenal), who hardly impressed.
But strangely, several English clubs think nothing of uprooting their players for lengthy overseas tours. Each summer, American fans are given the opportunity to spend big bucks to see FOX Soccer Channel come alive at their local stadium. This year is a bit quieter than normal because of the World Cup, but several big names, including United, have still chosen to spend their preseason in North America.
These tours include an awful lot of activity away from the field. United practiced in Chicago and scheduled games in Toronto (against Glasgow Celtic), Philadelphia (vs. the Union), Kansas City (against the Wizards on Sunday) and Houston (the MLS All-Star Game on July 28). That's a significant amount of travel. In addition, there are all kinds of photo ops and sponsor obligations that command the players' attention.
Prior to Wednesday's match at Lincoln Financial Field, the team was taken to the Philadelphia Museum of Art to recreate the famous scene on the steps from Rocky. One source told FanHouse that United's participation wasn't nearly as enthusiastic as the fictional boxer's.
On Thursday, a few hours before Tottenham Hotspur was scheduled to play the New York Red Bulls in New Jersey, United was across the Hudson River in Manhattan. There, several of the team's biggest names (including Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes) were supposed to participate in an outdoor charity event at 23rd and Broadway, organized by a club sponsor.
On Wednesday evening, United earned an entertaining 1-0 victory over the Union before 44,213 fans, many of whom were in red. The lines at the souvenir stands were deep throughout the evening. United left its World Cup participants behind, and had difficulty taming the MLS expansion side without Wayne Rooney, Michael Carrick, Nemanja Vidic, Park Ji-Sung and Patrice Evra. The Union had plenty of golden chances to score, and the visitors didn't find the net until the 76th minute, when Gabriel Obertan, a 21-year-old Frenchman, collected a quick through pass from Danny Welbeck and beat Philly reserve goalkeeper Brian Perk.
"It was a good game for us. Very good opponent. I thought they did really well," Ferguson said. "I thought they played better than expected."
The match clearly was a friendly. There wasn't much tackling, and United didn't do a whole lot of running off the ball. Perhaps the Rocky Steps weren't such a good idea so early in preseason. Maybe the travel and heat have taken a bit out of them as well.
FanHouse asked Ferguson if the taxing preseason tours make sense, in light of his call for a winter break in England.
"You need preseason games," he answered. "They're absolutely essential. Because there's no way they can do a preseason training program involving endurance and power, and then go into a campaign in a week. You need these games to get their timing, their rhythm, and their breathing right. It's impossible without it."
But do those preseason games need to be across an ocean? Do they need to involve travel to six different cities? Do they require detours so players can kick soccer balls at giant watches (click charity link above)?
"We have to do preseason anyway," United goalkeeper Edwin van der Sar (below) told FanHouse. "You have to play games. This is part preseason and part commercial, and that's fine for the players. We get enough rest, and sometimes you have to do something for the club and for the sponsors, and that's the two-way system, I think."
"A winter break would be nice, but [the World Cup problems are] just a situation that sometimes happens," Van der Sar said. "Some countries go out a little earlier than the other ones. I don't think it's a trend or something, but we'll just have to keep an eye on it."
So it's a coincidence that the semifinals were relatively Premier League-free?
"I think so, yeah," he said.
Either way, the tours just seem like a burden. United certainly should be given tons of credit for playing MLS teams and not insulting the public with walk-throughs against other European sides like we saw during the Champions World days, and the games are a fun day out for the fans. But if the clubs and Football Association really cared about long-term results, they'd figure out another way to accomplish the goals Ferguson referenced above.
But we know they don't, and we know the arrogance that permeates English soccer likely will forever prevent them from making the changes they need to make. Every two years, the English fans and press claim their national team is ready to win a major championship, they claim their players are the best in the world and hungry for glory, and every two years they fall far short. They say the game is their birthright. But they've sold that birthright to suits and sponsors who wring the players dry and clubs that continually shunt young English talent aside to make room for big-name foreigners. And the fans are complicit, refusing to demand change.
That arrogance prevents a rethink, and we've had the chance to catch a glimpse of it over the past couple of months. FanHouse was there in Rustenburg during Fabio Capello's press conference the day before England faced the U.S., and we watched as the F.A. moderator refused to allow any American journalists to participate. Even more galling, Capello did not think enough of the U.S. to mention it, or any of its players, during the event.
We saw it again on Wednesday. United players were steered through the "mixed zone" as they exited their locker room, where reporters were waiting to interview them as they passed by. FanHouse endured, and heard similar stories from at least three others, English journalists -- visitors to this country -- growing angry if an American approached a player they were interviewing.
Mixed zones are a free-for-all. You stick your tape recorder where it will fit and yell out a question when you can. There are no exclusives. But several English reporters felt the rules didn't apply to them, that their needs were paramount and that they could march into the U.S. and tell us how it's done.
It was stunning, and Scholes, for one, was guilty as well, giving two English reporters his time, walking right by an American who asked politely for a moment, then stopping again for another Brit. We're quite certain that the veteran midfielder has received far better hospitality during his stay in the U.S. than he showed his hosts on Wednesday.
But that's all part of the preseason tour. It asks a lot of the players and clearly doesn't leave them at their best, on the field or off.