Lamar Hunt Quotes

I think I'm being conservative when I say there are more people playing soccer in the United States than in 90% of the world's other countries, probably 95%.

The more people who come from abroad who played soccer and are brought up playing it and watching it, then come over to America and bring what they know and what they play, that's how the sport will grow.

I think soccer is more respected now than it ever has been. You can see that in the numbers of young kids who are playing and the numbers of people who are coming to watch.

I've seen the growth of this game in this country, the stadiums that were built, the great European players that have come and the great American players who've been created. Americans want to be number one at everything. And they are at baseball, football, basketball. Soccer is growing fast, and I want to be a part of that.

You can't obviously predict the future, but I am a fan of the United States and soccer over there continues to grow.

I never knew that Americans would take up soccer, and it's a gender-free sport in high school there.

I've never had a problem finding a team, a league, or a pickup game. Actually, I'm not sure I want soccer to get bigger. We have so many teams in San Francisco that there aren't enough fields.

Even all the top players going to Europe to play helps soccer in America, as do all the MLS players like Beckham and all that, they're trying to promote it. At the end of the day it's about getting the younger generation interested at an early age so most of them will move on and play.

I think - I hope - that we're going to be able to build something here with U.S. Soccer, where it's not just going to be about one lost match or one lost cycle or one lost team. It's going to be about an entire country rallying around an entire sport in a way that lasts.

My wish is that soccer in the U.S. become on the same level like the Premier League, Spanish league, or the Bundesliga.

Kids in Africa start kicking a ball when they are six or seven years old, if not younger. It's like baseball, basketball and football in America. If you're talented, people will find you. That's what happened with soccer. The number of academies has grown rapidly, and people are really into it.

We want the N.W.S.L. to grow. It is growing; it's continuously growing every year. We want it to be sustainable. It's separate in the sense that this is a U.S. Soccer thing, but the idea is to grow soccer in general, and we want to do that any way we can.

I think it's important to make clear, you know, that the problem with American soccer... it isn't talent.

I think what we really want to do is to create a real soccer nation. We want to have kids really wanting to play the sport.

I think soccer in America is growing exponentially, and it's just going to keep getting bigger.

All three of my kids play soccer. Each one of them started from the time they were about 5 or 6, and we just love it.

I am excited to bring my deep knowledge, passion and expertise of soccer in this country to The New York Cosmos. They truly represent where this sport is headed on a national and international level, and I want to make history with them.

The Olympic Games must not be an end in itself, they must be a means of creating a vast programme of physical education and sports competitions for all young people.

If you want to know whether soccer is big in America, pick a weekend, go to any park in the land, and pay attention. We're there. We've always been.

That's what I'd like to do on the President's Council. Make sports and athletics available to every youth in America, not just one day a week like it was for me, but every day.

Over the last 10-15 years, you've seen soccer finally start to grow at a fast pace, start to get the recognition it deserves, and I think it has to do with all of the people who come to America from foreign countries.

Television is making sports universal; for the same reason, big-time soccer is growing more popular in the United States.

The philosophy of FIFA is to expand world soccer space, to spread out the world football space.

I'm not a huge soccer fan, but I follow the sport. I played in high school, a little bit in college, played on various club teams most of my life, and all three of my sons are competitive soccer players and far better than I ever was.