In the past, I found it easy to support imperialist teams, but that calculation becomes more complicated the more those teams change. Paris-born star Kylian Mbappé is the son of a Cameroonian father and a mother of Algerian descent. Canadian Alphonso Davies was born in a refugee camp in Ghana. Twelve of the 26 players on the U.S. team are black, as many as the 1994, 1998 and 2002 teams combined.
One of them, Sergiño Dest, was born in the Netherlands to a white Dutch mother and an American father whose ancestry dates back to Suriname. On Tuesday, in the 38th minute of the game, Dest headed the ball to Christian Pulisic, a white American considered the best player in the country, who put it in the goal to give the United States a 1-0 lead.
“USA!” The crowd around me sang along, exchanging high fives and howls. I applauded too, raising my arms in triumph and pride for the country to which my Filipino elders emigrated.
When the game between Iran and the United States began, I said I was one of three people of color in a bar filled with about a hundred people. Then, early in the second half, two more took the empty seats next to me, Bassel Heiba Elfeky and Billy Strickland, graduate students at New York University in Boston for a physics lecture. I quickly realized that Elfeky supported Iran. He spoke quietly at first, his tone gradually rising as the match intensified in its final minutes, with the United States desperately clinging to its lead. When the rest of the bar complained about a penalty called against the United States, he took the first one. As the rest of the bar applauded an American corner kick, he shook his head.
“It doesn’t seem right to me to go for the United States,” said Elfeky, who grew up in Egypt and moved to the United States to attend college. “They have a lot of money. And the men make a lot more than the women, even though the women are much better. Then there is Iran, which is a complete underdog.”
Strickland, who grew up in Los Angeles and is of part Japanese descent, said he would root for the Japan team over the United States if they played each other. Elfeky said he always supports the United States men’s soccer team.
“At the end of the day, they play a very boring game,” he said of their tactical style.
In the final minutes, the United States cleared an Iranian shot that seemed destined to tie the game, and Elfeky let out a “damn.” When the final whistle sounded, sealing the United States’ victory, he sighed, shrugged his shoulders and said, “It was a good game.” Both teams played hard, helped each other off the turf and demonstrated the camaraderie that leads people to say that sports transcend politics. on an instagram mailAmerican player Tim Weah would call Iran’s players “an inspiration” for how they “showed so much pride and love for their country and their people.”
Elfeky carried the disappointment familiar to any fan forced to acknowledge that justice rarely prevails in sports. While others around them took celebratory shots of whiskey, he and Strickland put on their jackets and backpacks and headed out. Soon Iran’s players would also be home to face what awaits them.
