Where are all the Latinos in US Soccer?
ESPN Soccernet produced a couple of excellent videos about the changes concerning Hispanics in US Soccer. At the beginning of the first video there’s a statistic that jumps out. It states that 45% of MLS attendees are from Latino descent. Looking at soccer pitches, you see numbers that don’t come close to mimicking that figure. Only 5 members of the US National team pool are from Latino descent. That’s about 9% at the current pool of 51 players. So what needs to change?
Soccernet tackles this question and finds that US Soccer is already starting to work on the issue. This video doesn’t address all the problems, but it’s a good start.
Watch this 2 part video series for an excellent primer on what US Soccer is doing to be more reflective of the changing demographics of American soccer.
Part 1
Part 2
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Good videos. I’m glad to see this being addressed. The USL, from the PDL on up, can help to bring more Hispanic players into the fold. That’s especially true down here in Texas, as well as California, Florida, etc. I just wrote about the new PDL team down in the Rio Grande Valley, which joins the Laredo Heat and the El Paso Patriots as teams that are literally on the border.
Which brings me to Houston. Not on the border, but that city still has the third-largest Hispanic population in the United States (per Wikipedia). Now take a look at the Dynamo’s roster. I don’t mean to accuse anyone of discrimination, but with the exception of Kei Kamara and Brian Ching, it’s got to be about the whitest bunch of guys you’ll ever see take the field. Okay, it’s the original Earthquakes, transplanted from San Jose, but that was 4 years ago now!
For the record, I’d root against that classless gang of orange-clad losers no matter what their players’ ethnicities. But this has had me stumped ever since I noticed it.