US comes kicking and screening to beautiful game

Greg Lalas wrote a powerful piece a few years back in Soccer America about how he took the decision at the age of 24 to leave professional soccer.

It was 1997, and he had been joined at the MLS team, the New England Revolution, by his world-famous brother, Alexi.

He had played a total of just 100 minutes of football, all off the bench, and suddenly he’d had enough. He was going to turn his attention to writing and this passage written a few years later showed why.