Last Bus to Toronto

In 1942, Howard K. Smith, later the anchor of ABC's evening news, wrote Last Train from Berlin: An Eye-Witness Account of Germany at War, detailing his work from the Nazi capital for CBS radio. He had gotten out of the Reich on the last train that left Berlin before the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.

As I write this at around 7:30 PM on January 19, 2017, the last bus that would leave New York City and arrive in Toronto before noon tomorrow, leaving at 10:30, there are 5 seats left. The one before it is sold out.

People really are fleeing America.

This is written to the tune of "The City of New Orleans," written by Steve Goodman, best known by Arlo Guthrie.

Why Toronto and not Montreal, which is a better city and 100 miles closer? Because most Americans can't speak French.

Riding on the Last Bus to Toronto.
Port Authority, Thursday evening bail.
Fifty seats, all filled by restless riders.
Three rest stops, and hope to stay out of jail.

All along the northbound odyssey
the bus pulls across New Jersey
and rolls along through Lehigh Valley fields.

Passing towns with Indian names
Harry Chapin's banana plain
and the graveyards of rusted automobiles.

Goodbye, America, I'll miss ya.
Say, doncha know me? I'm your native son.
I'm the ride they call the Last Bus to Toronto.
I'll be gone 500 miles before my ride is done.

Checking e-mails before the Syracuse stop.
Dunkin Donuts, watch the lattes pour.
See the screen with CNN a-showin'
some stuff that makes our sad hearts hit the floor.

And the folks who wanted Bernie
and who worked for Hillary
get back on that smelly Greyhound made of steel.

Think when approach Buffalo
Trump's fans are like Juggalos:
They are psycho clowns, and fear is all we feel.

Goodbye, America, I'll miss ya.
Say, doncha know me? I'm your native son.
I'm the ride they call the Last Bus to Toronto.
I'll be gone 500 miles before my ride is done.

Morning on the Last Bus to Toronto.
Niagara Falls, it greets a brand-new day.
Almost home, we'll be there by lunchtime
as Customs men process us, to Queen Elizabeth Way.

But all the folks left behind seem
to be stuck in a bad dream.
The Deplorables still ain't heard the news:

The jobs you lost will not return.
The wall won't halt the ozone burn.
Our land's got the disappearing freedom blues!

Goodbye, America, I'll miss ya.
Say, doncha know me? I'm your native son.
I'm the ride they call the Last Bus to Toronto.
I'll be gone 500 miles before my ride is done.

Arsenal In America: The Complete History

May 31, 1972, Orange Bowl, Miami.

1 Goalkeeper (GK) Geoff Barnett (in place of the injured Bob Wilson)
2 Right Back (RB) Pat Rice
3 Left Back (LB) Sammy Nelson (in place of Bob McNab)
4 Midfielder (MF) Peter Storey
5 Centreback (CB) Frank McLintock (sub: 14 John Roberts)
6 CB Peter Simpson
7 MF George Armstrong
8 MF Alan Ball (sub: 12 Eddie Kelly)
9 Forward (FW) John Radford
10 FW Ray Kennedy
11 FW Charlie George.

Miami Gatos 2-3 Arsenal, the Gunners coming from 1-0 at the half. The Gatos were a North American Soccer League franchise that played from 1972 to 1976, known after that 1st season as the Miami Toros -- the Cats becoming the Bulls. Goals by George, Radford and Kennedy. Attendance: 4,725.

May 23, 1973, Varsity Stadium, Toronto.

1 GK Bob Wilson
2 RB Pat Rice
3 LB Bob McNab
4 MF Eddie Kelly
5 CB Richie Powling
6 CB Peter Simpson
7 FW Peter Marinello
8 MF Brian Chambers
9 FW John Radford
10 FW Charlie George
11 MF George Armstrong
(No substitutions were used. Peter Storey and Ray Kennedy did not play.)

Toronto Select 0-1 Arsenal. Charlie George scored the game's only goal. Attendance: I can't find a reference.

Four days later, in a game that was in the CONCACAF region but not on the North American continent, Arsenal beat Devonshire Colts in Bermuda, 4-0. It was the same lineup, with Charlie scoring again, as did Marinello (in his last appearance for the club), and Radford twice.

Other CONCACAF, but not North American countries or country equivalents where Arsenal have played include Trinidad & Tobago, Jamaica, Curacao and Aruba in 1965, and Trinidad & Tobago again in 1982 and 1985. Arsenal have never played in Mexico, nor in any nation that could be called "Central America."

Their only visits to South America have been Summer tours of Brazil in 1949 and 1951. They've played in Africa in South Africa in 1964 and 1993, and in Egypt in 1982. Their visits to Asia have included Japan in 1968 and 2013; Singapore in 1975, 1977, 1990 and 2015; Thailand in 1975 and 1999; Malaysia in 1975, 1999, 2011 and 2012; the United Arab Emirates in 1976; Kuwait in 1977; China in 1981, 1995, 2011 and 2012; Indonesia in 1983 and 2013; Saudi Arabia in 1984; and Vietnam in 2013. They went to Australia in 1977, and will return in 2017.

August 6, 1989, Joe Robbie Stadium, Miami Gardens.

1 GK John Lukic
2 RB Lee Dixon
3 LB Gus Caesar (in place of Nigel Winterburn)
4 MF Michael Thomas
5 CB David O'Leary
6 CB Tony Adams
7 MF David Rocastle
8 MF Kevin Richardson
9 FW Alan Smith
10 MF Paul Merson
11 MF Steve Morrow (in place of Brian Marwood or Martin Hayes)

Independiente 1-2 Arsenal. Club Atletico Independiente, of Avellaneda in the province of Buenos Aires, were the defending champions of Argentina, as Arsenal were the defending champions of England. This was for the Zenith Data Systems Challenge Trophy, a phony "world championship." "Rocky" Rocastle scored from open play in the 1st half, and from a penalty in the 2nd half.

For the 2nd time, Arsenal decided that the best place in America to visit during the Summer was Miami. Attendance: 10,042, the vast majority of them Hispanics rooting for the South American team. Each team had someone sent off: Independiente, a player; Arsenal, oddly enough, physio Gary Lewin.

July 26, 2014, Red Bull Arena, Harrison, New Jersey, outside New York.

1 GK Wojciech Szczesny (46th minute sub: 26 Emiliano Martinez)
3 LB Kieran Gibbs (played entire game)
7 FW Tomas Rosicky (71st minute sub: 37 Chuba Akpom)
8 MF Mikel Arteta (46th minute sub: 34 Francis Coquelin)
10 MF Jack Wilshere (71st minute sub: 56 Jon Toral)
16 MF Aaron Ramsey (46th minute sub: 24 Abou Diaby)
18 CB Nacho Monreal (played entire game)
19 MF Santi Cazorla (71st minute sub: 53 Kristoffer Olsson)
25 RB Carl Jenkinson (46th minute sub: 39 Hector Bellerin)
35 MF Gedion Zelalem (46th minute sub: 20 Mathieu Flamini)
45 CB Isaac Hayden (46th minute sub: 48 Ignasi Miquel)

New York Red Bulls 1-0 Arsenal. Attendance: A sellout of 25,219, including myself. If the game had been played at the 41,922-seat Citi Field in Flushing, Queens; at the 49,638-seat new Yankee Stadium in The Bronx; or even at the 82,566-seat MetLife Stadium, at the Meadowlands Sports Complex in East Rutherford, New Jersey, it would still have sold out. That's how much of a following The Arsenal have in America, and particularly in the New York Tri-State Area.

Bradley Wright-Phillips, son of Arsenal legend Ian Wright, scored the only goal. Diaby had a goal disallowed for offside -- incorrectly, I thought. (Some things never change: Even in meaningless games on other continents, The Arsenal get screwed over by the officials.) It is ironic that the Arsenal player most known for not playing due to injury has come the closest to scoring in an Arsenal uniform than any player I've ever seen. I have seen Thierry Henry score, and in that very stadium, but for the Red Bulls.

Several Arsenal players who featured in the 2014 World Cup did not make the trip: Germans Per Mertesacker (4) and Mesut Ozil (11); Frenchmen Laurent Koscielny (6) and Olivier Giroud (12); Englishmen Theo Walcott (14) and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain (15); and Chilean Alexis Sanchez (17).

As a result, the club was short at certain positions. Rosicky, normally a midfielder, played the 1st 70 minutes up top. Monreal, normally a left back, was moved to centreback. Zelalem, only the 3rd American ever to play for Arsenal (after Frank Simek in 2003 and Danny Karbassiyoon in 2004), became the 1st player from a CONCACAF nation to play for Arsenal in a CONCACAF nation, let alone his own.

This game, and the 2012 Emirates Cup 1-1 draw between the clubs, may be as close as we come to Henry, who with only 9 seasons in an Arsenal shirt falls just short of qualifying, ever getting an official testimonial.

July 28, 2016, Avaya Stadium, San Jose, outside San Francisco.

33 GK Petr Cech (67th minute sub: 26 Emiliano Martinez)
2 RB Mathieu Debuchy (46th minute sub: 24 Hector Bellerin)
3 LB Kieran Gibbs (46th minute sub: 18 Nacho Monreal)
10 MF Jack Wilshere (46th minute sub: 17 Alex Iwobi)
14 FW Theo Walcott (67th minute sub: 68 MF Chris Willock, his Arsenal debut)
15 MF Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain (67th minute sub: 32 FW Chuba Akpom)
16 CB Rob Holding (his Arsenal debut, played entire game)
28 MF Joel Campbell (69th minute sub: 31 FW Jeff Reine-Adelaide)
34 MF Francis Coquelin (46th minute sub: 29 Granit Xhaka, his Arsenal debut)
35 MF Mohamed Elneny (67th minute sub: 40 Gedion Zelalem)
37 CB Krystian Bielik (46th minute sub: 21 Calum Chambers)

MLS All-Stars 1-2 Arsenal. Campbell and Akpom the Arsenal scorers.

Ozil, Koscielny and Giroud did not play, because they featured in Euro 2016. (Ozil at least made the trip. Mertesacker was injured.) Chilean Alexis Sanchez (now wearing 7) did not make the trip, because he featured in the Copa America.

Attendance: Listed as exactly 18,000, which, if true, would be a sellout. Just 2 days later, Liverpool and AC Milan played just a few miles away at Levi's Stadium, the new home of the NFL's San Francisco 49ers, and sold out at 68,500. I have no doubt that Arsenal, never mind the MLS All-Stars, could have sold that out, too.

July 31, 2016, StubHub Center, Carson, California, outside Los Angeles.

13 GK David Ospina (68th minute sub: 26 Emiliano Martinez)
14 FW Theo Walcott (46th minute sub: 32 Chuba Akpom)
15 MF Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain (65th minute sub: 40 Gedion Zelalem)
16 CB Rob Holding (played entire game)
17 MF Alex Iwobi (65th minute sub: 68 Chris Willock)
18 LB Nacho Monreal (46th minute sub: 3 Kieran Gibbs)
19 MF Santi Cazorla (46th minute sub: 28 Joel Campbell)
21 CB Calum Chambers (46th minute sub: 37 Kristian Bielik)
24 RB Hector Bellerin (46th minute sub: 2 Mathieu Debuchy)
29 MF Granit Xhaka (46th minute sub: (35 Mohamed Elneny)
34 MF Francis Coquelin (65th minute sub: 31 Jeff Reine-Adelaide)

Club Deportivo Guadalajara 1-3 Arsenal. Holding, Oxlade-Chamberlain and Akpom the Arsenal scorers against the team popularly known as Chivas. A rare match in which no players wearing Numbers 1 through 11 started.

Attendance: 24,000. This may have been the 1st time that a Mexican team has played in California and had their fans outnumbered. Three days earlier, Chelsea beat Liverpool nearby at the Rose Bowl in front of 53,117. Arsenal would have done at least that well.

Goals scored by Arsenal in North America, December 11, 1886 to July 27, 2016: 6
Goals scored by Arsenal in North America, July 28 to 31, 2016: 5

U.S.A. 1-1 Argentina: Cold Night, Hot Game

Last night was 2 firsts for me: My first time inside the new Meadowlands Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, and my first time watching the U.S. national soccer team.

If I ever do either again, it will not be at the same time. Forget the fact that the huge number of Hispanics in the New York Tri-State Area almost made it seem like a road game for the U.S. -- a factor also in cities like Los Angeles, Dallas, Houston and Miami.

But the one thing everybody hated about Giants Stadium was the wind. The brand-new $1.6 Billion stadium having no roof at all, and a nasty wind swooping in off the wide Hackensack River and slicing through the concourses, turned it into a giant meat locker. I actually had to wear my U.S. national team jersey over my winter jacket. (Now I'm glad I got the XXL size.)

Let me get the most important thing out of the way, and say that the fans were great. The Argentines were loud and waved a lot of flags, but caused no trouble at all. And their legendary grilling prowess did something I thought impossible: It made the Meadowlands parking lot smell great.

The Americans got a little stroppy after some perceived bad calls by the officials -- only one of which was bad enough to upset me -- but nobody took it out on the visitors, at least that I saw.

The crowd was announced as 78,936, making it the largest paid attendance that's ever included me, and 3,630 short of capacity, although the place looked absolutely full, and the public-address announcer said it was a sellout. So the discrepancy is probably due to complimentary tickets.

Not surprisingly, there were a lot of fans in Barcelona shirts & other Barca-themed items, because of Argentina's Lionel Messi, who plays for Barca. Very surprisingly, there were at least a dozen people wearing Arsenal items -- myself not one of them, but it was so cold I wished on a few occasions that I'd brought a scarf.

I saw a couple each of Chelsea, Liverpool, and Manchester United (one fan had the green & gold Newton Heath scarf, one of these "Love United Hate Glazer" people, and I told him, "Nice Norwich scarf, pal!"). One fan wore an Everton shirt with Landon Donovan's name and Number 9 (10 for the U.S.), and there was a guy in a Fulham shirt with Clint Dempsey's name and Number 23 (8 for the U.S.).

A few Real Madrid items because of Angel Di Maria, a few Internazionale (a.k.a. Inter Milan) because of Javier Zanetti and Esteban Cambiasso, and several Argentine clubs I didn't recognize, along with the 2 that I would, the 2 giants of Buenos Aires, Boca Juniors and River Plate.

*

In a way, this game was the exact opposite of a lot of Arsenal matches I've seen:

* The team in red (usually, the U.S. wears white or navy blue, this was the debut of the red shirt with the navy sash) looked very much overmatched by a team that was passing the ball around, as if toying with them. I got the feeling that, like Arsenal, Argentina could have turned it on and won this game easily any time they wanted to.... But they didn't.

* A big (in hype, at least) striker missed some easy shots. Messi was not "the best player in the world" last night. His dribbling is sick, and he can really pass, but he was 0-for-5 on shots. His shooting was so far off the mark that the U.S. goalie, North Brunswick, New Jersey native and Everton star Tim Howard, made none of his saves against Messi: None one of the shots was on target. It reminded me of Arsenal's Nicklas Bendtner -- even if Messi's height didn't (he's officially 5-foot-7, Bendtner's listed as 6-foot-3 1/2), nor his hair (although it was equally silly).

* A big star on the dazzling team got hurt -- or seemed to. Like a lot of Spanish and Hispanic players, Messi dives in order to win favor from the referees. On one play in the 1st half, he ended up rolling around like he'd been sprayed by shotgun pellets. There was a 3-minute delay (but only 1 minute of injury time was added), and a stretcher was brought out. Guess what: He got up, took a couple of minutes to shake it off, got back on, started the Argentina goal, and was still on at full-time. Diva twit.

* The overmatched team decided to get a little rough. There were no cards for Argentina, and 4 yellow cards for the U.S., and I have to admit that all but 1 were deserved. We made some good clean tackles, but also made a few that were rough, including a couple we totally got away with. It really was like cheering on a Dirty Northern Bastard team against an Arsenalesque one. I felt dirty.

* And, of course, the team that would have been happy with a draw was.

*

Nonetheless, the U.S. should have lost this game 4-0. The Argies kept coming and coming and coming. I don't know what the possession percentage was, but if you told me it was 70-30 Argentina, I'd believe it.

It was only through heroic defending that the scoreboard did not show that we got shellacked. Even on the Argentina goal: Just before the half, Messi set up DiMaria, and Howard (easily the most popular U.S. player last night, though our being in New Jersey may have had something to do with that) ended up making 2 amazing saves; unfortunately, a 3rd was required, and before he had a chance to get up and grab the rebound, Cambiasso slam-dunked it in. The goal was no fluke, it was very well-earned.

I can't say that about our goal. The New York Red Bulls were missing half their roster due to international duty or injuries (including Thierry Henry), and one of them was Juan Agudelo, the 18-year-old Colombian-born, Barnegat, New Jersey (Shore)-raised Red Bull, who came on in the 2nd half for the useless Jermaine Jones, and took advantage of Argentine goalie Sergio Romero's inability to hang onto a Maurice Edu shot, and dinked it in for the equaliser.

After his goal, a photo was taken of Agudelo, sticking out his tongue. The model here is not basketball legend Michael Jordan, whom Agudelo is too young to remember well, but former Arsenal Captain Patrick Vieira, now running out the string with Manchester City.

After 40 minutes scoreless, I would have loved a draw; once Cambiasso scored, I began to beg for a draw. I think a lot of us were begging, and we got it. The place went mental: You'd have thought it was Donovan's injury-time winner vs. Algeria in the World Cup all over again, while the Argentines were stunned that they let in such a bad one. (Again, it was just like watching Arsenal... in reverse.)

The last 20 minutes were agonizing... and this game didn't count for a damn thing! But when the referee mercifully blew his final whistle, with 1-1 being the final score, the reactions were as I would have expected if you'd told me beforehand it would end in a draw: The Argentines didn't care, they knew it was a friendly and a night out and a chance to spend a weekend in New York City and environs; the Americans were overjoyed that they held one of the world's defining football nations -- and a much better team than their own -- to a draw.

Men of the Match: For the U.S., Howard, then Agudelo. Defenders Jonathan Spector (West Ham United) and Oguchi Onyewu (AC Milan) were great, Captain Carlos Bocanegra (St-Etienne) was awful in the 1st half but great in the 2nd, and even Donovan played a little defense. For Argentina, Gabriel Milito (like Messi, of Barcelona), then Cambiasso. Javier Mascherano (also Barcelona) was a pain in the ass, too. I just now realized there was no sign of Manchester City's Carlos Tevez -- is he hurt? He could have made a huge difference.

All I wanted was to not have it be miserably cold, and for my national team to not get embarrassed by one of the world's footballing powers. That wish, like the game itself, was a draw: The weather sucked, but the game was cracking. Not only did we not get embarrassed against a team that tried to make that happen, but we held our own, and protected our house. Nobody drank our milkshake.

No, U.S. soccer isn't there yet. But, as the song goes:

We're on our way!
We're on our way!
We'll hit the big time!
We're on our way!
How we'll get there, we don't know!
How we'll get there, we don't care!
All we know is that we're on our way!

It's Not Only a Game

Because of the soccer-related activities tomorrow, I am unlikely to be able to post throughout the day. So let me pause to remember the victims of September 11, 2001.

There were 1,747 who, at the time, were living in the State of New York. Of those, 1,147 lived in New York City.

There were 694 from New Jersey, including 3 from my parents' hometown of Newark, 3 from Bloomfield where I first lived, and 8 from East Brunswick where I've lived most of my life. (That's EB's 9/11 Memorial in the photo.)

There were 92 from Massachusetts, 81 from Virginia, 65 from Connecticut, 50 from Maryland, 49 from California, 30 from Pennsylvania, 11 from the District of Columbia, 10 from New Hampshire, 9 from Illinois, 6 from Texas; 5 each from Florida and Rhode Island; 4 each from Alabama, Georgia and Maine; 3 each from Louisiana, North Carolina and Ohio; 2 each from Colorado, Delaware, Hawaii, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri and Oklahoma; and 1 each from Arizona, Idaho, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, Tennessee, Utah, Wisconsin, and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

There were 13 from Britain, 6 from Germany, 5 from Canada, 3 from Australia, 3 from Japan, 2 from China, and 1 each from Bermuda, El Salvador, Grenada, Ireland, Israel and Sweden.

On an anniversary like this, it seems silly to think about sports. But sports can help us to heal. That was true in 1989, in Britain after the Hillsborough Stadium disaster in Sheffield during the FA Cup on April 15, and in the U.S. after the earthquake in San Francisco during the World Series on October 17. It was true during the Great Depression and in World War II. And it was true after 9/11.

How can anyone see how New York reacted -- first in that incredible Mets comeback in the first New York home game after the attacks, then in the Yankees' remarkable postseason run -- and say it's "only a game"?