The Wolf Helps the Metros Survive

By Drew

Giants Stadium was the scene of a festive doubleheader of soccer on May 31st. First, in a showdown between the victims in the two of the greatest victories for the United States in the World Cup, Colombia played England. Unlike those two glorious games, hopes were high that this match up would result in neither a universally ignored movie nor the death of one of the players at the hands of his own fans. Following the international exhibition, in a game which the purported crowd of 55,000 really came to see, the Metros were going to face off against the Chicago Fire in yet another search for their first home victory of the season.

Even prior to the tailgate, there was controversy. John's late arrival meant that we had to purchase grills if we wanted to have something other than chicken wings. Luckily, Keith and Brian spared no expense in getting two of the finest grills priced under $10 which Wal-Mart had to offer. Then, the elevators at my parking lot were broken, meaning that Ronen and Jason had extra time to fight over shotgun rights while I prayed that my car wasn't stuck for life. Eventually, everything worked out and we arrived at lot 16A around three hours prior to game time, at which point the parking lot was already starting to fill up with supporters of the two guest nations.

The tailgate was another stunning success. Although we missed Paul and Greg (I'm as shocked as you are), the tailgate was full of all sorts of special guests. We had people who were English and people who wanted to be English. We had reality TV show winners (Survivor and Metro Soccer Report host Ethan Zahn) and people who wanted to be reality TV show winners. We had the father of a Metros player (Tim Regan's dad) and Ronen, who wants to be the father of a Metros player. For some unknown reason, Joey showed up in a tie, leading us to speculate either that he was getting married again or was late to his own funeral. We finished all of the cold beer in the cooler (all of which came in green bottles) and headed off into the stadium, confronted, for the first time all season, with long lines to get in.

Giants Stadium was filled with the supporters flags from various once-proud cities in England. I'm sure that as Ashley Cole drives his Bentley around Piccadilly with his supermodel girlfriend, he's warmed by the fact that Swindon loves their national team. Of course, this game was the US debut of David Beckham, who elicited high pitched squeals of delight from the women and Keith every time that he touched the ball. The NJSEA even covered the field with grass, robbing the Metros of a built in excuse for another loss. Both the English and Columbian fans were in loud and good spirits and the game was a closely fought 3-2 victory for the English, who were led by a hat trick from Michael Owen. Although we were rooting mostly for good soccer, we took to cheering for the Columbians, both because of the late arriving John's heritage and because Ronen wanted to celebrate as many Colombian goals as possible.

After the first game ended, someone must have heard a fire alarm, because the building began to rapidly empty. I'm sure that most of the fans had to check something in their cars, and were surprised at the NJSEA's no re-admittance policy. The few thousand that remained saw a mediocre first half of soccer, highlighted mostly by Ronen's abuse of the fans behind us who wanted to sit in our row. Additionally, some remaining England fans figured out the weak dollar meant that they could drink for cheap, and they began chugging, chanting and singing for the entire game.

Early in the second half, Chris Wolfe of the Fire was awarded a deserved penalty after being chopped down by Tim Regan. Jesse Marsch beat Zach Wells with the PK and it looked like the Metros were going to drop another three points at home. However, in the 76th minute, as the English fans began a conga line around the stadium, Amado Guevara sent a free kick into the six yard box which was coolly headed into the net by our favorite lead footed sub, John Wolyniec. Woly replaced Youri Djorkaeff at half time, after the Gallic striker needed to leave to have his cane repaired. The Metros poured on the pressure in the late minutes, doing everything to win with the exception of bringing in the King of Goals, Sergio Galvan Rey. Finally, in the last minute of stoppage time, Abbe Ibrahim won a ball in the Metros half, which he passed to Guevara. El Lobo took a couple of steps to his right and hit a perfect bending shot into the top right corner of Zach Thornton's net. The Idiots celebrated, the final whistle blew, and the Metros had a 2-1 victory, their first this season at the friendly confines of Giants Stadium.