Tony Meola: US soccer has improved since playing days

MAJOR LEAGUE SOCCER

Tony Meola was goalkeeper for the U.S. Men's National Team in 1994 when the Americans played Moldova in a FIFA World Cup friendly at Davidson in 1994. It was the U.S.'s only visit to Mecklenburg County before Sunday's Concacaf Gold Cup match against Trinidad and Tobago at Bank of America Stadium.

U.S. goalkeeper Matt Turner was two months shy of being born the last time the men’s national team played in the Charlotte area.

That was on April 20, 1994, in a tune-up game against Moldova leading into the first FIFA World Cup played on U.S. soil. The match was played in the cozy confines of Richardson Stadium at Davidson College – 4,790 fans turned out, almost two-thirds less than the 12,000 fans who filled the same arena the previous December for the 1993 NCAA College Cup final between Virginia and Indiana, which closed a three-year, sold-out run at the venue.

Turner and his USMNT mates play Trinidad & Tobago in the Group A finale of the Concacaf Gold Cup on Sunday at Bank of America Stadium. Kickoff is at 7 p.m., followed by Honduras and Haiti at 9 p.m.

This is the fourth Gold Cup doubleheader in Charlotte, following successful events in 2011, 2015 and 2019, all of which, along with big crowds for five International Champions Cup matches – an average attendance of just under 55,000 – and a 2010 Mexico national team friendly that drew 63,227, helped sell Charlotte as an MLS city.

Mexico is a proven draw when they play in the U.S. and Charlotte hosted them in the Gold Cup each time, with 46,012 passing the turnstiles in 2011, 55,823 in 2015, and 59,283 four years ago. Even Trinidad and Tobago have experience in Charlotte, with a 4-4 draw against Mexico in 2015.

Now it will be time for U.S. supporters to show their colors.

Nothing like the last time

Flashback to spring of 1994. In goal for the U.S. in 1994 was Tony Meola, the New Jersey native and two-time All American at Virginia as a freshman and sophomore before turning professional to prepared for the American team at the 1990 World Cup in Italy.

Named the best collegiate player in the country with the now-combined Hermann Trophy and the MAC Award in ’88 and ’89 respectively, Meola was in the nets against Moldova in Davidson. He was the keeper for all three matches in Italy and another four the summer of ’94 when the Americans lost to eventual champions Brazil 1-0 in the Round of 16.

So focused on what lay before him and his teammates with the 1994 World Cup, Meola, now 54, says he doesn’t remember much about the Moldova match, a 3-0 USA win, except that the late Terry Holland, who was basketball coach at Virginia when Meola was there, moved to Davidson as the Wildcats’ athletic director. Holland had played for and coached the Wildcats before leaving for Charlottesville in 1974. He returned to Davidson in 1990 as AD and would go back to UVA in ’94 in the same position.

What he does recall is the connection he had then and still has with his teammates.

“I think I have nothing but fond memories of everything we did,” Meola, now a host of SiriusXM FC’s “Counter Attack” show, told The Post. “I am proud of that group because it was hard to make the commitment back then. It's really easy now to make the commitment. There's everything there for you. But other guys at that time were worried about what tomorrow was going to look like, and whether there would be enough money on the on the table for certain things.”

Soccer in America was markedly different in the early ‘90s and before that, fast growing as a participation sport but wallowing on the professional front with the collapse of the North American Soccer League in 1984, leaving no real first division level options available domestically for more than a decade.

While current generations have grown up with World Cup participation as expected normalcy – 2018 being an aberration – 1990 was the first World Cup participation for the U.S. since 1950, where the Americans famously beat England 1-0 in Brazil.  No such glory in Italy. It was three and out, with losses to Czechoslovakia (5-1), Italy (1-0), and Austria (2-1), but the Americans were there and guaranteed to be back as hosts in the next tournament.

“Being part of the national team. That was it. That was the game in our country,” Meola said. “That was the pinnacle, just like it is now. It’s different times but I do think that sort of the stories and the myths of how ‘difficult’ it was and what we didn’t have, have grown over the years. But there’s no doubt that that there’s more resources, the pool of players is much bigger.”

Exporting American talent

According to various sources, there are over 60 Americans now playing in Europe whereas three decades back, it was rare.

Foremost were UVA teammate and current Greenville Triumph coach John Harkes, who played 161 games in England for Sheffield Wednesday, Derby County and West Ham from 1990-96.

Former North Carolina State star Tab Ramos played in Spain for Figueres and Real Betis from 1990-95.

Eric Wynalda played in Germany for 1. FC Saarbrucken and Vfl Bochum from 1992-96, scoring 36 goals in 90 matches.

South Africa-born Roy Wegerle played 196 games for six English clubs from 1986-95, most successfully for Queens Park Rangers, where he scored 29 goals in 65 games from 1990-92.

Europe didn’t work out for Meola, who had trials with Toulouse in France, Brighton & Hove Albion, and Watford in England in 1990.

The stage for the American player that was the 1990 World Cup helped change that, as would 1994 and every World Cup since.

“The opportunities for players in this day and age are much bigger,” Meola said. “We didn’t have MLS that they have now but it’s not as if we had nothing. Where we were in the ‘90s is so far ahead of where so many teams in our Concacaf region are now that it’s incredible to think about.”

The amenities of being a national team and professional player in America now are certainly better.

“We stayed in decent hotels; we didn’t fly charter. But the whole world wasn’t flying charter. So it was equal ground, you know.”

Meola, the 2000 MLS MVP, says that’s the way it should be.

“At the time, when you’re playing, you're only worried about getting better at what you have in that moment, and trying to do your best like everyone would do,” he said. “You’re not really thinking about what people will have 30, 40 years down the road. You’re just worried about yourself and trying to get better every day.”

Meola’s blue-collar mentality came naturally. His mother drove a fork-lift at work.

He says younger players he came into the national team with benefited from the trials of those before them and hopes those who followed his group reaped the reward of their work, and that it continues that way with each generation.

“I certainly was one that fought for more things as I got older,” Meola said, “because we saw the things that were happening around the world, and what will people were getting around the world, and where we could be better. But I wouldn't trade any of the moments we had for anything, because I think all of them, all of those things helped me personally develop as a player.”

Comments