I wouldn't want to play Bruce Arena in cards.
During the three days leading up to the USA-Germany game, Arena was sandbagging.
For a guy who claimed one of the worst parts of his job was dealing with the media, he was loving it. After the win over Mexico, the pressure was off.
What did he think of the poll in which German fans picked their team to win by a margin of 80 percent to 20 percent?
''Hmm, 80 percent to 20 – that sounds about right,'' Arena said. ''I mean, they're supposed to win, right?''
What about the Germans' size advantage?
''Clearly, we're never going to match up physically with the Germans,'' he responded. ''We'd have to go back to the U.S. and get the L.A. Lakers to play for us.''
What about the pressure on his team?
''If we don't win this game, we'll be fine,'' Arena said. ''We'll go home and everyone will be happy. I'm not sure how the German team will be if they lose to the U.S. They may not be heading straight back to Frankfurt.''
What did he think about the lucky pfenning the Germans rub – actually a P.R. stunt by the tabloid Bild – before a game?
''With all the money the Germans make, that little penny can't make a difference,'' Arena joked to the reporter from Bild.
This was the same paper that quoted German assistant coach Michael Skibbe after the USA-Mexico game as saying, ''We can consider us to be in the semifinal.''
While it's unlikely that Skibbe said anything of the sort, the remark summed up the German attitude.
Arena saw it just the opposite.
''We'll enter the game Friday with the belief that we can win,'' he said.
No one listened.
NO CONSOLATION. Asked to describe the mood of his players after beating Mexico to advance to the quarterfinals, Arena said, ''They don't worry about anything.''
And him?
''I enjoyed it, but not perhaps to the extent I should,'' he added in a rare moment of self-reflection. ''It's my job to get the team ready for the next game.''
If Arena didn't have a chance to celebrate the victories, he took the 1-0 loss to Germany pretty hard, racing into the locker room as soon as the game ended.
That the Americans were the better team was no consolation.
''We expected to be the best team tonight,'' he said.
There was no next game to prepare for, no semifinal, no third-place game or final. Arena had said this spring that the United States would never be world champion in his lifetime, but the way the breaks were falling he was getting close to having to eat his own words.
Wishful thinking? Sure. But the way this World Cup unfolded? All the big boys except Brazil were gone. And the breaks?
Fortune was on the Americans' side, even in qualifying. What if Honduras hadn't hit the post five times in the second half against Trinidad & Tobago at home? The Hexagonal might have turned out differently.
The United States couldn't have asked for a better draw at the World Cup. The position at D3 meant that it would never have to leave its base in Seoul unless it made it to the final in Yokohama.
The schedule worked in the Americans' favor. They got their four points – but in the exact opposite order from which everyone predicted.
If the Portuguese hadn't opened up against the United States, there's no way they'd have underestimated the Americans.
On the first corner kick of the USA-Portugal game, Portuguese midfielder Petit didn't stick to the far post and collided with goalie Vitor Baia, allowing the ball to bounce loose and John O'Brien to knock in the rebound.
In other circumstances, O'Brien's punch in the Mexico game would have been a penalty, and it would have been 1-1 – unless Brad Friedel stopped a third penalty – with Mexico having all of the ball.
Who would have figured the chain of events on the last night of group play? Only needing a tie to advance, Portugal had two players sent off and went out with a 1-0 loss to South Korea, allowing the Americans to ease into the second round. Better yet, they got Mexico, a team they'd beaten in four of the previous five meetings, and not Italy, which they've never defeated.
NO ARGUMENT. Luck isn't the only thing that got the United States to the quarterfinals, but it sure didn't hurt. Therefore, there wasn't much argument from the American side about the non-call on Torsten Frings' handball on the line.
The German great Franz Beckenbauer had little doubt.
''It's actually a clear penalty kick when one's hand touches the ball on the goal line,'' he said. ''It should have been a penalty.''
Arena wasn't so sure.
''It might have been,'' he said. ''But that's part of the game.''
The Americans weren't on the list of teams that went home crying foul.
''We had a lot of things go right,'' admitted Landon Donovan, ''a lot of breaks.''
The U.S. buildup was perfect. Arena overcame the injury to Chris Armas, considered a key to the U.S. team in midfield, less than a month before the opener. There was no bickering in camp. No coach got more out of his team at the World Cup than Arena did. With the exception of Jeff Agoos and Clint Mathis, every player played up to or beyond his capabilities.
There's no guarantee everything will go right the next time. In four years, the big boys aren't going to mess around with their preparations. And they aren't going to underestimate the United States.
Will the United States ever be world champion in Arena's lifetime? Probably not.
Incredibly, though, he had the World Cup in his sight.
by Soccer America Managing Editor Paul Kennedy in Ulsan