The Keeper: A Life of Saving Goals and Achieving Them (28 page)

Later, I’d observe to Chris Woods how surreal the moment was. “A few centimeters’ difference,” I said, “and they’d be calling it a horrendous mistake.”

Chris gave me a knowing look, one battle-hardened veteran to another. “Goalkeeping margins are razor thin.”

We were still down 1–0 at the half. It wasn’t until the 64th minute that we busted through. Jermaine latched onto a poor clearance off a corner kick and unleashed a howitzer that flew through the packed box and into the far corner.

Game on.

We thought we had it won ten minutes from regulation when Zusi squared a pass across the goalmouth. Clint was first to the ball, knocking it in off his chest. Judging by the roar that shook the stadium, our fans believed the game was over.

You can never count out the great players, though. They are always capable of producing something special as long as there are still seconds on the clock.

And there were. Michael lost the ball in midfield and Cristiano pounced. The lob he floated over our defense was inch-perfect, far enough out of my reach that his teammate Silvestre Varela could run onto it. He headed in the equalizer as the last seconds ticked off the clock.

What a sucker punch by Cristiano that was! He was barely noticeable for ninety minutes and then on the last play of the game, he came up with a piece of artistry that only a few players in the world could have pulled off.

We were numb as we walked off the field. Truth is, 2–2 is not a bad result against a team of Portugal’s pedigree, except when you think you’ve already beaten them. But as deflated as I felt, I couldn’t let my disappointment get in the way of seeing my family. Ali, Jacob, and Laura would return to Memphis in a couple of hours.

In the locker room, I quickly stripped down to my shorts and T-shirt, put my running shoes on, and jogged back onto the field. I waved to Ali and Jacob, blew kisses, and pretended to catch their kisses back. We had as much fun as we could given the distance between their seats and the grass.

When it was time for them to head to the airport, I blew them one final kiss—just the latest in our countless goodbyes—and I began to think about Germany.

T
here were many intriguing subplots to our Germany game. For one thing, Jürgen had coached their national team two World Cups ago and some of the same players were still on the squad.
For another, Joachim Löw, the guy who had helped Klinsmann transform that 2006 German team into an attacking force, would now be matching wits with his old mentor. And then there’s the number of German American players on our team. Five of them had been born and/or raised in Germany and had spent their careers in the country’s top-tier Bundesliga, going head-to-head with many of the players we were about to compete against.

There wasn’t a question in my mind that Germany was the best team in the tournament. They had physicality, skill, guile, and remarkable tactical awareness.

They were as close to the perfect side as there was in Brazil.

Fortunately, we didn’t need to beat them to advance; a draw would automatically get us through. There was even a scenario by which we could qualify for the knockout round with a loss; we had a slim margin over Ghana based on goal differential. As long as we could maintain that, we could still advance. Ghana would play Portugal as we faced off against Germany.

“I need to know the Portugal-Ghana score,” I told Chris Woods. Depending on what happened in that game, I could adjust our defensive strategy. If we absolutely needed a goal to advance, I could push one of my fullbacks forward, take more risks. But if we might get through even without a goal, I could tuck players in, hold them back, and concentrate on not letting Germany score on us.

“Okay, Tim,” said Chris, “Got it.”

Before the game, there had been some talk in the media about how Klinsmann and Löw might agree to take it easy on each other and have their teams play for a draw since that would be enough for both teams to advance. Whoever concocted that ridiculous scenario clearly doesn’t know the competitive mind-set
of the two coaches, let alone the 22 players who would be on the field.

On the contrary, this would be anything but a stroll in the park.

From the kickoff, Germany attacked relentlessly. Because they always seemed to have the ball, that meant I had a busy 45 minutes. I made a couple of tough saves but at halftime, the game remained scoreless.

Then in the 55th minute, I dove at full stretch to keep out a shot by the big German defender Per Mertesacker. I could only parry it to the edge of the box where Thomas Müller was lurking. Müller ripped a grass-cutter past me into the far corner. Germany was up 1–0.

I glanced at Chris Woods then. He held up both index fingers. He was telling me that a thousand miles away, Portugal and Ghana were tied, 1–1.

If Ghana got another goal, and if our score remained the same, we’d be going home.

In the 73rd minute, two of our players, Jermaine Jones and Alejandro Bedoya, collided with each other going for a high ball. I could hear the smack of their heads from where I stood, half a field away. They both crumpled to the ground. Jermaine lay there for two minutes. Later we’d learn that he’d fractured his nose, too—our second broken nose in three games.

With ten minutes left, Chris flashed me a 2–1 score with his fingers, without noting whether Ghana or Portugal was ahead. I glanced at Matt Besler, who gave a slight shake of his head, as if saying, “Don’t ask me.” I turned back to Chris. He gave the thumbs-up sign. Portugal was on top.

All we had to do now to advance was not to concede another goal. That is, if the Portugal-Ghana scoreboard didn’t change.

We played it tight until the final whistle. There was the tiniest pause then, when no one was 100 percent sure of the Portugal result. Then suddenly the subs and coaches on the bench were sprinting toward us on the field. We’d lost this game, but it was clear from their faces that we had won something bigger.

Portugal 2, Ghana 1. We would advance.

B
efore the Belgium game, my mom and I went out to dinner at a landmark restaurant in the lush Jardins district of São Paulo.

Right away, I heard people whispering about me.
Tim Howard . . . goalie . . .

U.S. keeper . . . Tim Howard . . . that’s him.

Mom and I sat together for a long time. We talked about the tournament, the children, the Leadership Academy that would soon open in New Jersey; Faith had told me recently that it would bear my name.

We talked about Laura and Trey: they’d tied the knot last October.

“It’s nice to see her so happy,” I said.

My mom smiled. “It’s funny,” she mused. “My generation is the one that had bitter divorces. Maybe yours will find a kinder way of doing it.”

We talked about the future—what my life might look like in a few years when I was done with soccer and finally able to move back to Memphis.

Dan was encouraging me to take advantage of opportunities right now, to sign endorsement and broadcasting deals.

Mom sighed. “It’s hard to believe that you might retire someday,” she said. “I can’t imagine you doing anything else.”

“I know. But I’m thirty-five now, Mom.”

It was easy conversation, the most leisurely, undistracted time we’d had together—just the two of us—in years. Here we were at this exquisite restaurant, and all around us people were surreptitiously trying to snap my photo. But in a way, it was as if we were right back in one of those roadside motels in Jersey: just me and Mom, eating our PB&Js. It was like nothing had changed, even though everything had.

“How do you feel about Belgium?” my mom asked.

I gave her an honest answer.

“I think it’s going to be a tough game,” I said. “But they’re certainly beatable.”

S
o much has been said about the Belgium game. Every minute of play has been analyzed, every save I made has been dissected as if I were some kind of lab animal.

Since July 2, 2014, I’ve seen what feels like eight million images of the game as it was refracted through other people’s eyes.

I’ve seen the images from packed stadiums and crowded living rooms and standing-room-only bars and city squares. I’ve seen still photos and video clips of people watching: the crowd in Soldier’s Field, my family, even Landon. I’ve seen photographs of strangers clutching their heads in anguish. People peeking through their fingers as if they’re afraid of what they might glimpse, yet they cannot look away.

It’s hard to connect all those images to what I experienced on the field.

Here’s what I would tell someone about the first 45 minutes of that game: We fought hard. We held our own. Nobody scored.

Then ten minutes into the second half, something shifted. It was like the Belgium players got a turbo boost during halftime. Suddenly every time I looked up, a ball hurtled toward me. Mertens took a shot. Then Fellaini. DeBruyne. Origi. Vertonghen. DeBruyne again. Vertonghen again.

By the end of regulation time, Belgium had 31 attempts on goal to our 7. They had 16 corners to our 4.

None of them got through. We went into extra time believing we would find a way.

E
very game a person plays is a culmination of all his experiences leading up to that moment. That was as true for me in the Belgium game as it has ever been.

It was as if 20 years of learning from my role models had been distilled into that 120 minutes.

Take the first save I made, for example—the shot by Origi that I kicked away with my leg.

That one came from playing in all those New Jersey youth league games. That save made me feel like I was 15 again, working with Mulch. I had been a good athlete then, but I was still raw. To protect the goal, I had to make myself big, use every part of my body.

By the time I got to my fourth save—a leaping fingertip deflection over the crossbar—I was right back in my MetroStars days, knocking the ball away from the chaos and confusion in front of me. In fact, the entire second half reminded me of playing on the losing-est team in the MLS. We were pinned back, defending for our lives just like we’d been all those years in Giants Stadium.

In a way, it felt like Mulch was right there with me—all of those painful “blast drills” that he insisted upon, when the shots flew in at me so fast, I didn’t have time to think. The times he made me get up and keep going, when I felt like I had nothing left to give.

But Mulch wasn’t the only one on the field with me. Tony
Meola and Kasey Keller were out there, too—Tony with his brash, blue-collar courage and Kasey with his dogged refusal to get rattled under any circumstance.

And those footwork drills that I’d hated so much when I first came to Everton? Those helped me make my sixth save. A low, hard ball came skimming across the grass, headed straight down my throat. Using Chris Woods’s balance drill, I killed it dead. Just like he always wanted me to.

Even Edwin van der Sar was in that game with me. My second and third saves required that I drop down and let my body cushion the ball as it pinged off my chest. That move? Classic Edwin; I learned it from watching him when I was his number two.

And the truth is, it wasn’t just my soccer influences I channeled. My Nana and Poppa and Momma and Mom. Laura and my children. They were all present in the urgency I felt. There had been so much sacrifice, by so many people, so many nights and months and years we’d been apart. I’d given up everything—my marriage, my home, my role in the day-to-day lives of Ali and Jacob—to be here.

I’d be damned if, in this moment, on the world’s biggest stage, those sacrifices weren’t going to be worthwhile.

A
ll through the match, I kept waiting to see Romelu Lukaku get off the Belgium bench and be summoned to the touchline as a replacement for Origi. Big Rom had been a game changer at Everton last season.

Now, as we headed into overtime, he was about to become one here as well.

Rom is so powerfully built, so deceptively quick, that he’s tough enough for defenders to deal with at the start of a game
when they’re feeling fresh and energized. The last thing I wanted was for him to come on the field now, when we were running on fumes.

His impact was instantaneous. He muscled the ball off Matt Besler near midfield and burst down the right flank. Then he crossed the ball to DeBruyne, who was making a run into the middle of our penalty area.

Besler raced back to our box and did his damnedest to block DeBruyne’s shot from one angle as I slid in from the other direction. Too late.

DeBruyne’s shot flashed through the sliver of space between where Besler could stop it and where I could. 1–0, Belgium.

W
e pushed for the equalizer with everything we had. We had a great chance when Jermaine blasted a shot from the edge of the penalty area. The ball took a deflection off of Jan Vertonghen, and it bounced toward Clint in front of the goal.

A couple of inches to Clint’s left or right, and he would have buried it. But the ball landed awkwardly under his feet. He couldn’t get a shot off before Belgium cleared.

By this point, Rom was causing havoc down at our end of the field. Twice, I had to scramble the ball away from his low drives.

But I could do nothing about his third attempt, which came in the last minute of the extra-time half.

DeBruyne had torn down the left flank. He sent a defense-shredding pass between Cameron and Besler. It was right in Rom’s flight path. Rom never even broke stride as he rifled the ball past me.

Now we were down 2–0, with just a single 15-minute half left in the game.

I glanced up at my mom in the stands. The look on her face was one I rarely saw. It was pure anguish. She’d been riding the crazy emotion of this game with me—hell, she’d been riding the crazy emotion of my life with me—that second goal had devastated her.

I flashed her a hint of a smile. I pumped my fist slightly. It’s like I was saying to her,
It’s okay, Mom. It’s going to be alright
. It was as if we’d reversed roles since my days on the rec field.

The thing is, even if the rest of the world had given up hope, I still believed.