Relative Something

Yesterday, Elysa and I got to see the US Women’s soccer team in a friendly match against Switzerland at US Bank Stadium in Minneapolis. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

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Once again, we took the light rail train from her neighborhood to the stadium. My vague plan worked out perfectly and we entered the correct gate of the facility to put us directly at our section. For this game, I selected seating on the opposite side of the field from where we sat for the International Champions Cup match back in August.

These seats were also located a lot closer to the field. It was great to be able to hear the chatter from the players as they directed each other during play.

Unfortunately, whatever was used in attempt to mask the NFL markings on the field made for a rather ugly backdrop, but once the action started, I didn’t have a problem ignoring that.

I have very limited knowledge about our national team, and absolutely none about the Swiss, but quickly discovered Switzerland is pretty good. They played smart and executed very well, jumping out to a 1-0 lead and dominating play while putting us on our heels.

The US was able to tie it up after a smashing goal by none other than Carli Loyd before the half was over.

I don’t know what happened at halftime, but the second half performance by the US side was completely different. We dominated play and scored a variety of nice goals, winning the game by a pretty dominating score of 5-1.

It wasn’t until I got home after the game that I read that these two teams had already met in a match held earlier in the week. The US won that one as well, 4-0, so maybe the home team was just playing a little too overconfident during the first half of this game.

Maybe the best thing about the match for me was that it kept me from being able to witness the sad performance by the NFL Vikings in their first loss of the season. Those are just the kinds of games that make me want to stop watching the home team altogether.

A bad game in any team sport is so much easier to watch when it is not my home team that’s stinkin’ up the place.

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