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 had to start all the way down the divisions and that is really difficult. You might be playing well and having great performances - but nobody ever watched us.
It's been a big flaw of ours in the soccer department that a lot of our best athletes go and play other sports. But I think young players have seen me, and others, go over to Europe and play in some of the best leagues - and MLS is improving so much, too.
Let's build women's football from the bottom before we get to the top; it's not about building from the top to get to the bottom. We can talk about the Etihad and Man United's ground, the Theatre of Dreams, in a few years' time. Let's fill the Academy Stadiums, the Kingsmeadows, first of all.
In the 1990s, we had seven great teams - Milan, Inter, Juventus, Parma, Lazio, Roma, Fiorentina. If you look at the players, they were great players, but there was some crazy investment, and some teams went bankrupt, like Parma and Lazio.
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.
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.
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, for everyone who wants to get to the highest level, you have to be in the Premier League, of course.
My wish is that soccer in the U.S. become on the same level like the Premier League, Spanish league, or the Bundesliga.
But I think there is a space for a second league, which is UTS, that is more modern, and is targeting a difference audience.
There is simply no better way to generate buzz for soccer in your country than having your team in the World Cup.
I love Major League Soccer, covered the first game in 1996 in a funky stadium in San Jose, and I applaud just about every move that its commissioners, Garber and Doug Logan, have made.
I think it's important to make clear, you know, that the problem with American soccer... it isn't talent.
I hope that everyone tries to help to increase the level of the MLS and also that American players like Pulisic are here and not in Europe. That should be the goal for America. I just try to help as much as I can.
