Traveling to or even through Las Vegas inevitably dredges up this line from Hunter S. Thompson's Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Unlike Hunter...err Raul Duke, I arrived not in a bright red Cadillac convertible, but rather on a cool blue Harley Road King, courtesy of Intermountain Harley Davidson in Salt Lake City. Our departure on Wednesday morning from Salt Lake was poorly timed, as it was raining cats and dogs. While I had thought to bring along rain gear, I quickly learned which items of clothing I had brought were inadequate for the purpose of riding 70 mph in a torrential downpour. Unfortunately the Rain was to hound us for 250 miles of this trip, occasionally venturing into snow and once into hail. Being pelted by hail while riding on the freeway has to rank among my least favorite things in the world. Once we finally cleared the storm in St. George, we were greeted by gale force shear winds while we descended into the Virgin River gorge. So it was, soggy and beaten down by the wind that we entered Vegas on Wed. afternoon.
Our hotel room at the New York, New York was enormous, rather large enough to play a game of 1 v 1 without destroying any furniture. The NY has a very posh Irish pub with immaculate decor and I'm told quite a fine menu...Unfortunately it lands rather on the pricey side of my tastes in Irish pubs so we bailed out of that scene in favor of Vegas' only soccer pub, The Crown and Anchor, where the Magners is poured into 20 oz imperial pints for a paltry $5, and the waitress uniforms would offend the hell out of Nessie.
We rolled out of Vegas in the morning needing to arrive at out Long beach hotel by 4:30 in order to make Thursday's game featuring our Yanks v. Guatemala. As a special bonus, Guate's squad featured everyone's favorite diving whore, the Pescadito himself, Ruiz. The Sam's Army experience was not what I expected at a major international match...While generally organized, the crowd suffered from a drummer with ADD. Guate played a good match, but was ultimately stifled by the US defense, though Ruiz did manage to bait Onyewu into his second yellow of the match, forcing the US to play with 10 after the 73rd minute. The US looked crisp and primed for this match, though Dempseys 26th minute finish did a lot to help the US cause, opening up Guate to several dangerous US opportunities to close the first half. The crowds on hand were VERY vocal, though it seemed El Salvador and Guate had definitely brought the most supporters. The rhythmic stomping of si se puede can only be described as thunderous. El Salvador managed to slip by Trinidad in the second game of the day.
Saturday's game was one which several months ago was much anticipated...unfortunately, T&T was missing a core 7 players (who made up the bulk of the team that qualified for the 06 Cup) due to a financial dispute with the T&T football federation. Despite the lack of talent on the pitch, Trinidad's Darryl Roberts a 22-year-old striker with Sparta Rotterdam looked very strong against the line-up the US played. Bradley opted to rest virtually the entire starting line-up from the Guate game, starting only Benny Feilhaber in both games. After some midfield miscommunication led to some T&T attacks near the end of the first half, Bradley brought Donavan off the bench to shore up the middle...a move which quickly bore fruit as he slipped behind the entire Trinidad defense to slip Johnson the easy goal in the 54th minute. A goal which brought forth the inevitable "We always score with our Johnson!" chorus from Sam's Army.
The next day we hopped back onto I-15 and started the dreaded 750 mile trek back. But it was a fantastic time, despite a few minor hiccups and you didn't even have to hear a report on the Carson correctional facilities
