Bruce Arena

Infobox Football biography
playername= Bruce Arena
fullname = Bruce Arena
nickname = Bruce "Where's my hot dog?" Arena


dateofbirth = birth date and age|1951|9|21
cityofbirth = Brooklyn, New York
countryofbirth = United States
height = height|ft=6|in=0
currentclub = Los Angeles Galaxy
clubnumber =
position = Goalkeeper
youthyears = 1968 1969–1971 1971–1973
youthclubs = Hota Nassau Community College Cornell University
years = 1976
clubs = Tacoma Tides
caps(goals) =
nationalyears = 1973
nationalteam = United States
nationalcaps(goals) = 001 0(0)
manageryears = 1973 1976 1978–1995 1995–1996 1996–1998 1998–2006 2006–2007 2008–
managerclubs = Cornell University (assistant) University of Puget Sound University of Virginia United States U23 D.C. United United States Red Bull New York Los Angeles Galaxy
pcupdate = 31 May 2006
ntupdate = 22 June 2006

Bruce Arena (born September 21, 1951 in Brooklyn, New York) is an American soccer coach, currently in charge of Los Angeles Galaxy. He is a former Head Coach and Sporting Director for New York Red Bulls of Major League Soccer and the former coach of the United States men's national soccer team. In previous stints, he coached several championship teams with both D.C. United and the University of Virginia.

Player

High school and college

Arena, a native of Brooklyn, grew up in Franklin Square in Nassau County on Long Island, New York. He attended Carey High School. While he excelled at several sports, he was too small for football so joined the school's soccer team as a defender. He moved into the goal when the starting goalkeeper was suspended after hitting another school's player during a game. While in high school, he also played a single season with the local team, Hota, of the Cosmopolitan Soccer League. After graduation, he began his collegiate athletic career playing both lacrosse and soccer at Nassau Community College, a two year college near his home, where he earned All-America honors. While at Nassau, he played for head coach Bill Stevenson and goalkeeper coach Shep Messing, a future New York Cosmos goalkeeper. At the end of his two years with Nassau, Arena transferred to Cornell University in upstate New York where he earned second team All-America honors, this time in only lacrosse. However, injuries to the school's first and second string goalkeepers led to the men's soccer coach, Dan Wood, recruiting Arena into the team as its goalkeeper. Arena backstopped the Cornell Big Red soccer team to the 1972 NCAA Men's Soccer Championship Final Four and earned Most Valuable Defensive Player honors for the tournament. [ [http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/May06/Arena_profile.ak.html Bruce Arena World Cup soccer ] ]

National team

In 1973, he earned his only national team cap as a second half substitute for Bob Rigby in a 2-0 loss to Israel. [ [http://www.rsssf.com/tablesu/usa-intres-det70.html USA - Details of International Matches 1970-1979] ]

Professional

After graduating from Cornell, Arena was drafted (but then cut) by the NASL Cosmos. However, he did play professional lacrosse for the Montreal Quebecois, spending a single season with the team in 1975. The National Lacrosse League folded at the end of the 1975 season, freeing Arena. At the same time, Dan Wood, who had recruited Arena to play for the Cornell soccer team, had been named the new head coach of the expansion Tacoma Tides which played in the American Soccer League. Wood contacted Arena and convinced him to move to the Pacific Northwest to play for him. [ [http://soundercentral.com/TidesUpdates/meet_the_tacoma_tides.htm Meet the Tacoma Tides ] ] While Arena was the second string goalkeeper behind starter Jamil Canal, the move to Tacoma was significant in that it introduced Arena to coaching. That year, in addition to playing for the Tides, Arena coached the men's soccer team at the University of Puget Sound.

Coach

College

In 1977, Arena moved back to teach at Cornell and act as the school’s assistant lacrosse coach. While he was there, the University of Virginia (U.Va.) advertised for two open coaching positions – head soccer coach and assistant lacrosse coach beginning the 1978 season. Arena took that opportunity and would go on to coach the U.Va. lacrosse team for seven years, before becoming the school’s dedicated soccer coach in 1985. Arena was the head coach of the Virginia program for 18 years, during which he won five national championships and amassed a 295-58-32 record. Additionally, he coached and developed many players at Virginia who would go on to play significant roles in the United States national team, including Claudio Reyna, Jeff Agoos, John Harkes and Tony Meola. In addition to coaching, Arena served as the ACC soccer coaches chairman as well as two three-year terms on the NCAA Division I soccer committee from 1989 to 1995.

D.C. United

On January 3, 1996, Arena left U.Va. to become the coach of D.C. United of Major League Soccer. The 1996 season would be both the team's and the league's inaugural season, so Arena needed to build a team from scratch. To make his position even more difficult, he had agreed to coach the U.S. U-23 national team at the 1996 Summer Olympics where it went 1-1-1. Despite the distraction of the Olympics, Arena managed to form his team and lead United to victory in the first MLS Cup. In addition to the MLS Title, Arena also took United to the 1996 U.S. Open Cup championship. Arena and United continued to experience success in 1997. The team won its second MLS Cup defeating the Colorado Rapids 2-1. Arena's success led to his selection as the 1997 MLS Coach of the Year. This year, Arena took United to the semifinals of the CONCACAF Champions' Cup. In 1998, Arena took United to its third consecutive MLS Cup only to see his team fall to the expansion Chicago Fire led by his protege Bob Bradley. However, while Arena failed to add another MLS championship to his resume, he guided United to the CONCACAF Champions' Cup title with a 1-0 victory over Toluca on August 16, 1998. He followed that with a defeat of Brazilian club Vasco da Gama to take the Interamerican Cup title. Arena was also the 1997 and 1998 MLS All-Star head coach.

National Team

Arena was hired by the U.S. national team to replace Steve Sampson as head coach in October 1998 following the team's disastrous showing in the 1998 FIFA World Cup. He forged the team into a successful international side, and is undisputedly the most successful coach in United States history: most international wins; longest home shut-out; best World Cup showing since 1930, reaching the quarterfinals at the 2002 World Cup, before a defeat against Germany; and all-time best international FIFA Ranking (4th place, April 2006). Arena also won two Gold Cup championships in 2002 and 2005, with a third place finish in 2003.

The 2002 World Cup was the high point of Arena's career as the U.S. coach. Heavy underdogs coming into the tournament, they stunned the world by beating a respected Portuguese team 3-2 in their opening game. Arena was lauded afterwards for instilling in his players the confidence to play aggressively against an international powerhouse. A hard-fought draw against host nation South Korea was enough to qualify for the second round, despite a poor loss against Poland in the final group game. Arena and the U.S. met old nemesis Mexico in the Round of 16, and Arena adapted his tactics brilliantly to secure a 2-0 victory and a quarterfinal berth. The U.S. switched from their usual 4-4-2 to a 3-5-2, and it paid dividends almost immediately when Josh Wolff, who Arena had brought in to fill out the formation, set up Brian McBride for the winning goal early in the first half. Arena switched the team back to a 4-4-2 for their quarterfinal against Germany, and the team continued to surprise many by dominating stretches of the game. However, they went on to lose 1-0 on a Michael Ballack header.

The U.S. national squad fell short of expectations at the 2006 FIFA World Cup, finishing last in Group E with losses to the Czech Republic and Ghana. The United States scored only twice in its three games, a draw against eventual champion Italy on an own goal by Italian Cristian Zaccardo and a goal from Clint Dempsey against Ghana. Some, including former team member and ESPN analyst Eric Wynalda, have blamed the poor performance on questionable coaching decisions by Arena, including not playing Clint Dempsey and putting DaMarcus Beasley on the right wing instead of his favored left vs. the Czechs, and using a defensive 4-5-1 in the must-win match vs. Ghana which the US eventually lost. Another questionable decision was made when Claudio Reyna became injured after the first goal when Arena subbed in defensive midfielder Ben Olsen to replace Reyna.

During his time as national team head coach, the U.S. Men's National team rose in the FIFA world rankings from being nineteenth to being fourth, though to the surprise of the U.S. players.cite news|title=FIFA adapting new world rankings|url=http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20060525.wfifa25/BNStory/Sports/home| publisher=Associated Press|date=2006-06-02] Bruce Arena's 71 wins as national coach from 1998-2006 are by far the most in U.S. history, making him arguably the most successful Men's US National Team Coach in history. But three weeks after the Americans' disappointing first-round exit from the World Cup in Germany, the U.S. Soccer Federation announced that Arena's contract would not be renewed when it expired at the end of 2006. U.S. Soccer Federation president Sunil Gulati explained Arena's dismissal, stating that the U.S. was seeking a "fresh approach."cite news|title=Arena finished as U.S. national coach
url=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13860292| publisher=MSNBC|date=2006-07-14]

Arena was eventually replaced by current U.S. coach Bob Bradley.

New York Red Bulls

On July 14, 2006, USSF announced they would not renew Arena's contract with the US national team. As a result, he began to pursue other coaching opportunities. That led to his being hired by Major League Soccer team the New York Red Bulls. Arena's first match with the club came on August 12, 2006 in a friendly against FC Barcelona. On November 5, 2007, the New York Red Bulls and Arena decided mutually to part company. During his year-and-a-half with the club, he went 16-16-10. He had two years remaining on his contract with the club.

Los Angeles Galaxy

He is now coach of the Los Angeles Galaxy. Bruce's son Kenny was a professional soccer player and spent time with the US youth national teams as well as in Major League Soccer.

References

External links

* [http://www.soccertimes.com/usteams/roster/men/arena.htm Profile at soccertimes.com]
* [http://worldcup.espnsoccernet.com/story?id=212462&lang=en ESPN feature on Arena, part I] ( [http://worldcup.espnsoccernet.com/story?id=212714&lang=en part II] ) by Marc Connolly
* [http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/si_online/news/2003/05/15/arena_flashback/ Sports Illustrated profile] by Grant Wahl
* [http://www.enquirer.com/editions/2002/06/01/spt_bruce_arena_americas.html Associated Press profile by Ronald Blum]
* [http://www.enysoccer.com/newsandfeatures/news/articles/2004/june/06_16_04_05.htm Article on Arena's visit to boyhood sites] by Michael Lewis