our next guest card on the U.S World Cup soccer team that divide odds by advancing
to the second round of competition before losing to Brazil man what a game that was
you know him you love him he gave you World Cup fever ladies and Gentlemen please welcome
number 22 Alexi Lalas Alexis [Applause] [Music] how you doing pretty good [Applause]
there it is after World Cup fever Alexi why don't you uh first of all how old a guy are you 24.
you're a kid so this is like I would guess for a soccer player an achievement of a lifelong dream
to be in the World Cup Tournament well first soccer player but for me no I mean really I'm
a soccer player uh you know I like last World Cup 1990 in Italy I mean to give you an idea of
how far off it is I mean I was in Italy bombing around with a bunch of high school friends you
know chasing women and drinking beer and basically it ought to be a World Cup for that you know what
I'm saying you know we were in this with the stands with our face painted and doing all that
stuff so yeah it never even occurred to me that I would be out there doing it so then how do you
go from that situation in your life to getting on the US team you just you know I played uh my
college ball at Rutgers University right and uh yeah and uh then I played in the Olympics and
after Barcelona I was called by the national team to come and try out and at that point I
didn't have a job or anything so I just wanted to get a job I was like please don't cut me and
it came through and the Final Cuts were like in um in June of this year and I was just like oh please
man don't cut me so none of us were answering the phone or doing anything and I made it
but they couldn't get a hold of you exactly they went right down the list he's out so he's on the
team run up the programs he ain't home um but now can you can you make uh money as a professional
soccer player on a situation like this uh one can make money as a professional soccer player
yeah I haven't made any yet but you know that change there's a lot of money over in Europe and
hopefully with the professional League starting up in 1995 there's a possibility so what will
become of the unit you played with now uh after the game which is like the Basketball Dream Team
in terms of everybody plays in different clubs and then gets together for these big tournaments
so everybody will go off into different clubs all over the world and then will this team ever
reassemble for any purpose yeah for 98 but oh well good for you and you think you'll be around for
that one that's like I hope so you know 28 that's four years away what is the oldest soccer player
at this level uh well we had a guy on our team who was 36 years old you know yeah the lifespan
you know it varies but I think you can play till like 35. now when you guys took the the
field against the Brazilians and this has to be the team favorite in the tournament wouldn't you
think I'm in Germany yet what was that what was that like were you scared silly were you just
were you nervous did you think you had a chance at all what was your I think that the attitude
that we had going through the whole tournament was that we could beat anybody and and we definitely
believe that we could be Brazil we didn't play as well uh in the Brazilian game but if you go out
there with you know you know and all the people you're playing you're doomed so you know that
was an attitude that we couldn't have and I think that that's what gave us the success is saying hey
we're just as good as anybody else do you think that Americans who maybe not were Avid soccer
fans before the tournament now know something about the game that will cause them to be fans
in the future I hope so I mean that's basically what this World Cup's done and such a great
thing because people that don't know anything about soccer and we're given the opportunity
to see what it's like when it's played by the best people you know I mean and and the whole
atmosphere around the world cup has been great well you know I would watch some of these games
ESPN has like a replay of the game very late at night and there's something very fascinating very
soothing very graceful about the game I mean it's really enjoyable to watch it's very rhythmic you
know and you're constantly running and everything like that can I trim that up for you just a little
just a little just take a little while wait no it's just just a little just a
little I won't take not that much just even it up that's all we're going to do all right
[Applause]
that ain't bad that's all right huh no no that's that's not a bad job there okay we
have time for Two Shots you want to go ahead yeah I'll do what I can there we go oh oh
[Applause] [Music] Alexi thank you very much no problem have a great summer
congratulations we gotta go folks thanks for watching good night everybody [Music]