|
 Ray
Bernabei
predicted in 1952 that it would take fifty years for soccer to
become popular in the United States. With the U.S. Men’s
National Team historic quarterfinal finish at the FIFA World Cup
in 2002, Bernabei was right on.
A member of the Hamarville
Hurricanes from 1949 until 1963, Bernabei served as a captain
during the team’s consecutive championships for five years in a
row during that time frame. Bernabei has a few more predictions
and thoughts about soccer in the United States, and he shared
his viewpoint with U.S. Soccer Players ...
Can you talk
about where you’re living now and what you’ve been doing since
retiring from soccer?
We now live in Sable Point, which is
in Longwood, Florida. We’ve been here for 23 years, since I
retired as the assistant country superintendent for Pennsylvania
schools. I was Executive Director, and continue to be, of the
National Intercollegiate Soccer Officials Association (NISOA).
The organization has 500 members, all college soccer referees.
We work with the NCAA, the NAIA, the NGCAA, the NCCAA
 and the
NIRSA, these are all independent administered national
organizations for college soccer in the United States, for both
men and women. We provide them with properly trained and
certified referees. I’m the executive director, so I manage all
of the training programs. Our staff is 216 people, who work as
volunteers, no one gets paid. We hold training camps every year
for training and certifying college referees, all over the
country, men and women. We try to make the refereeing more
uniform, with respect to the college rules, which are a little
different that international rules. I’m heavily involved in
NISOA, and we also are very supportive of National Soccer Hall
of Fame. We have annual induction ceremonies every August at the
Hall of Fame. NISOA is the only national organization that is
run independent of any direction or control of the NCAA. This is
the only referee organization for any sport that is run
independently. The benefits are that whenever you operate
functionally as your own organization, you establish your own
policies and use your own leadership style. We have liaison
people who work with national organizations, but we are a
referee organization independent of other organizations. That’s
the benefit. This is derived from so many people who are
volunteers, who give their time and expertise to assist in
training quality people. I personally don’t feel that there are
any drawbacks, if anything, there is added incentive to perform
at a high level because we’re held accountable to our
performance level. We don’t have anyone to fall back on. We’ve
got to show we are a professional organization and provide
quality performance, and that’s what we’ve done for 40 years,
since my involvement. Can you talk
about your playing days and what you remember most?
The thing I remember was playing
against such soccer greats and giants such as Walter Bahr, I
could go on and on and name names of people who were outstanding
soccer names in our era. I was captain of Harmarville in Western
PA for a 13-year period, and we had a run of 330 victories. That
came with only one game a week, played on Sundays. I was
particularly interested in getting quality players for our team
every year. We had two members of the 1950 World Cup team, Bobby
Craddock, and Nick DiOrio, who played for us. We had Steve
Grivenow, who played on the U.S. Olympic Team. I particularly
remember the men that I played with and them men I played
against, who are now the pinnacles of soccer today. They’re
still outstanding. When I see the ball players of today, I would
say those of yesterday were better. I’m not putting down these
ball players of today. But these fellows were quality
individuals. For example, Walter Bahr, could do a 50 yard
throw-in, like a bullet. Back then a throw-in was called a shy
ball. I had the privilege of playing against the world’s best,
which was a humbling experience. Can you talk
about some of the changes you’ve seen in the game of soccer?
From the playing side, I think the
skill level is quite different today than it was when we played,
and rightly so. You have to look at it in respect to the playing
field. We played on sand, or dirt fields. Today, we have plush
green fields. Things are very different today. The method today
is a short combination pass. Ours was more of a long ball pass.
As far as speed, it is no different today than when I played .
Ability, no different, head work, goalkeeping, no different. We
had some outstanding goalkeepers who played international ball.
Moreover, not
just the style of play but the ball itself. The ball was very
heavy, made of leather, with lace on it. Today, the ball is very
light. But our goalkeeper was able to kick the ball 70 yards.
Could you imagine how he could kick that ball today? The
differences in shoes. We used the English hotspurs. Today, they
use a light molded shoe. In yesteryear, we used baseball shin
guards, like what catchers will wear. There are differences in
terms of style, field, mechanics, and equipment. I’ve been asked
over and over if the players of my day were equal or better than
the players of today. I say, given the same equipment, the
players in my day would be better. I’m talking about the players
I played with and played against, not myself.
 In
1952, I was asked to give a speech while I was teaching and
coaching at a high school. I showed a slide of the World Cup
that England won years ago. I showed it for about ten minutes,
and one fellow asked me, ‘When will soccer be popular in
the United States?’ I said, ‘Soccer will be popular in 50
years.’ So, add 50 years to 1952, and you get to 2002 and the
men’s World Cup finish. I predicted it, and it happened. What
about popularity today? Soccer will never be popular as long as
the sportswriters and the TV commentators keep their heads in
the sand as far as the other sports are concerned. The writers
today are worse than in my day. They write very little about
soccer. Why, I don’t know. It’s the most popular sport played
today by youth, surpassing even baseball. Why is it that
children, when they reach age 16, age 18, drop out of soccer?
Yet that question also pertains to football, basketball, and
baseball. There’s a declining level of sports participation at
this age in every sport. Soccer is more popular now with youth,
I’d give it another 25 years, and good media leadership, and
maybe it will become as popular as one of the other sports.
I might add that soccer can be
promoted in a better manner, because I was promoting soccer when
I was playing. I was the liaison between our league and the
media. I promoted soccer by telephone and by communicating in
writing. We got a lot of publicity, by TV, radio and newspaper.
We can’t blame the newspaper on one hand, when we don’t do our
job on the other hand. We should have a PR director for every
league, youth included, in the U.S. We should be handing out
articles in terms of soccer, inviting reporters to our
conventions, our dinners. That’s what I did. Only we control our
program.
- August 2004 -
Where
Are They Now
Jill Beauchesne of the the U.S.
National Soccer Team Player Association and the on-line journal
Round Not Oval reports her conversation with Hall of Famers in
our newest feature. |
