NASL was at its last legs – only 12 teams played this year, almost all of them also playing in indoor championship. San Jose Earthquakes changed its name to Golden Bay Earthquakes and strange new team was added: the national team of USA, which was located in Washington, DC, and played under the name Team America. This team was practically the last nail in the coffin of failed concept – NASL was created with the grand idea of making soccer popular in USA/Canada. Popularity, it was theorized, would give birth of domestic stars, gradually replacing the aging foreigners. By 1983 it was crystal clear the whole thing was just a huge misconception: no real American talent emerged – US national team was practically made of foreign-born players, none of whom was wanted by European club. Canada was not different. Team America, the national team of USA, was the weakest in the championship, losing left and right. NASL almost entirely depended of foreigners, although big names were not coming in flocks anymore. There were still aging stars coming (Roberto Bettega), there was some young talent, dispatched to get playing experience ( Peter Beardsley), but the bulk of players were either old second-raters, playing for years in North America, often for 2-3 clubs in the same year, like the West Germans Arno Steffenhagen, Hubert Birkenmeier, and Volkmar Gross, or Europeans, who liked living in North America and aimed at settling permanently there, like Slavisa Zungul. But increasingly the players were anonymous and the number of stars sharply declined. Even popular and seemingly well-doing club as Vancouver Whitecaps featured only a handful well-known names (Peter Lorimer, David Watson, Frans Thijsen, plus Arno Steffenhagen, David Cross, and Peter Beardsley), so local players were added to the ‘famous ones’ at last – Bob Lenarduzzi, Tino Lettieri, and Carl Valentine. The shift was great, some players were recognized as stars not in the field sport, but in its more popular now indoor version – Slavisa Zungul would be a star of indoor soccer and practically nobody would associate him with the 1976 European Championship finals.
Yet, NASL continued with weird and pompous practices and rules, so from a distant the championship became entirely incomprehensible. The teams played 30 regular games each, no ties existed, but the points… New York Cosmos ended with 194! As if that was not enough, the American love for statistics featured entirely meaningless section of ‘percentages’ – as if one is confused by the muddle of points, to be completely in the fog with the obvious discrepancy between points and percentages… Go figure: Tampa Bay Rowdies finished with 7 wins and 23 losses, but 83 points. Team America won 10 games and lost 20 – good enough for… 79 points. Percentages told different story – New York Cosmos, the strongest team by the rules (22 wins and 8 losses, and 194 points) had 0.733% – Vancouver Whitecaps (24 wins, 6 losses, but… 187 points) had 0.800%. Nothing made sense – the teams were divided into 3 ‘Divisions’, but 8 out of total 12 participants moved to the next stage – and this depended on points only. So, the Eastern Division moved ahead completely, for the last in it – Montreal Manic had more points than the 3rd placed in the Southern and the Western Divisions. The early losers were:
Team America, 4th in the Southern Division and with technically the weakest in the championship.
Tampa Bay Rowdies – 3rd in the Southern Divison, but the team which won the least number of games – only 7 (and still finishing above Team America!).
Seattle Sounders – 3rd in the Western Division with 119 points, and
San Diego Sockers – 4th in the Western Division with 106 points. Things were most desperate here – the team had the lowest attendance in the league, a bit over 4000 on average.
The next round was direct elimination – two wins were needed out of three matches. American rules – third match was not played, if one team already won twice, but no ties were allowed.
Here New York Cosmos went out.
And perhaps Cosmos was the best example of the sorry end of NASL – despite the proud words, this was hardly the squad of 1983:
The indoor squad was more to the point – no more famous names. Still the most popular team – only Vancouver Whitecaps had bigger attendance this season, but we are talking home attendance… both teams were the only teams nearing 30 000 viewers. No other club reached even 15 000, so negligible money were coming from the gates. Anyhow, Cosmos was eliminated by Montreal Manic 2-4 and 0-1.
Vancouver Whitecaps, the other strong and well-attended team, was eliminated by Toronto Blizzard in three matches – 1-0, 3-4, 0-1.
Fort Lauderdale Strikers lost to Tulsa 2-3 and 2-4, and Chicago Sting lost to Golden Bay 1-6, 1-0, and 2-5.
In the semi-finals
Montreal Manic was eliminated by Tulsa 1-2, 1-0, and 0-3, and
Golden Bay Earthquakes lost to Toronto 0-1 and 0-2. If there is anything worth noting, that would be Wim Suurbier in the role of assistant coach. The picture is almost laughable… Don Popovic guiding the Yugoslavs (Zungul, Keri, Velasevic); Frank Avilla – the Latinos (Cuellar, Clavijo), and Suurbier – the Dutch and British contingent (Goosens, Sanderson). What came out of it is better left in the dark.
So, the big final – the Soccer Bowl’83. Toronto Blizzard vs Tulsa Roughnecks. The Roughnecks won 2-0.
By the look of the squad, Toronto Blizzard should have been the winner – Bob Houghton was coaching the former Swedish internationals Jan Moller and Conny Karlsson, Jimmy Nicholl, the Canadian star Bruce Wilson, the eternal Steffenhagen, Geoff Wegerle, all led by Roberto Bettega. But they lost… so, the other team must have been much stronger.
It was not… Tulsa Roughnecks had no recognizable players, not even one. By North American standards, it was impossibly anonymous squad, a classic underdog. And may be that was exactly why they won – the famous veterans hardly had any reason to do more than just appear on the field. The unknown boys were stronger collective and winning meant something to them. Well deserved victory, first – and last – title for Tulas Roughnecks, bright future ahead…
Bright future? Right after the championship Montreal and Seattle folded and Team America left NASL too.