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World Cup qualifier for US set for St. Louis
The U.S. soccer team will play its first qualifier for the 2018 World Cup at Busch Stadium in St. Louis on November, 13th and the playoff for the 2017 Confederations Cup will be held at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California.
Busch Stadium will host the match, which represents the team’s first game in St. Louis since a 0-0 draw with Paraguay at Busch Conference & Sports Center (now St. Louis Soccer Park) in June 1997.
Busch Stadium will have a slightly different look for its next soccer game. Scullin Steel followed up two years later before Stix, Baer and Fuller (later known as St. Louis Central Breweries) went to four straight finals from 1932-1935, winning all but the first. Keough would taste domestic cup glory of his own, winning with St. Louis Kutis in 1957.
Though the city’s only pro team plays in the third-tier USL, soccer has a long history in St. Louis.
Many events are planned leading up to the game. In May, in a friendly featuring the eventual Women’s World Cup champion United States against New Zealand, the Americans won 4-0 before 35817 fans, the largest crowd in U.S. history for a standalone women’s friendly. “We don’t really care who it is in St. Louis – it’s the USA that we’ll be cheering for that day”, says St. Louis Cardinals’ Vicki Bryant.
Current U.S. MNT defender Tim Ream, as well as former U.S. internationals Taylor Twellman, Steve Ralston, Chris Klein and Pat Noonan also earned their soccer stripes coming up in the Gateway to the West.
St. Louisan Lori Chalupny, a member of the 2015 Federation Internationale de Football Association Women’s World Cup championship team, talks with reporters Monday at Ballpark Village in St. Louis.
The U.S. will open World Cup qualifying in St. Louis as the first of six matches in the semifinal round.
