To all those who rode their first wave of U.S. soccer fandom into the hot Mexican dust, welcome! Brush that dirt off your coat. Hang it up. Stay awhile. And chin up for god sakes. It’s not that bad. I’m here to help you through it. There are just a few things you should know so you don’t make rookie blunders like buying an Eddie Johnson jersey or dislexifying Onyewu’s name.

1. As you see, we get to trade hands-behind-our-back gut punches with Mexico. It’s only fair, except we take punches in Mexico with both hands behind our back, and they take punches with only one hand behind theirs. Therefore you should always complain that they hit us with dirtier and louder and more painful shots. Because they do.

2. No matter how easy it seems to qualify for the World Cup, remain skeptical when asked about the U.S.’s prospects of doing so. Play up underrated third world competition: “I dunno, I mean teams without stable governments just have more to play for, you know.” We don’t want too many other continental confederations catching onto the fact that qualification in CONCACAF is structured like those End-of-Camp-Prizes where even the kid who threw a flaming poop pie at another cabin gets an award for his attitude. As much as the U.S. would benefit from a more difficult road to qualification, imagine qualifying once every twelve years, like Ireland or Romania do. Screw that!

3. Whenever we lose or tie you should question Bob Bradley’s lineup decisions. This goes for being a fan of any soccer team, but especially a Bob Bradley team. To do this, simply pick a few players who aren’t Donovan, Dempsey, Onyewu, or Howard, and then ask why Bradley played them. Try it for the Mexico loss. “Man, I don’t understand why he started Clark or DeMerrit or _____ . They’re ok, but they’re just not international quality.”

4. Brian Ching starts because he’s a good “target man”. He’s kind of like an NBA player that sets a really good screen, plays solid defense, and maybe can throw an accurate entry pass. Fundamentals are very very important, especially when trying to compete at the international level. Got it?

5. One way to look like you know what you’re talking about is to say, win or lose, that the U.S. would be better off if it hired a renowned international coach.

6. Also, when watching games with friends, you should say at least once a game that U.S. soccer needs to change its development structure “from the ground up.” You don’t need to provide any details about how to accomplish this. The only evidence you need is that the U.S. never wins any big games and hasn’t produced its own Pele yet. People will be in awe of your deep knowledge of the system’s flaws.

7. Oh, and if you really want to be a true national team fan, you should make sure that you know all the players on the U.S. team but nobody on any other CONCACAF team that we play. Except it’s OK to know that Blanco guy, and that tricky Gio-something-or-other on Mexico, our arch-rivals. But you’re not allowed to know or praise anyone else because then you might look too sympathetic. Refer to these players by number or racial epithet. Anytime a player on some third world team appears one of the best players on the field then it’s obviously a result of the U.S. playing so shitty by comparison. It’s way easier to criticize the U.S. players’ performances than learn and praise new names.

8. You should probably buy a “Soccer Wave” for your kids. These are really handy, because they like totally launch the ball back to you! If you can’t afford one of these revelations then you should settle for those precisely angled nets that bounce the ball back to you in the air. Just don’t let your kids pass the ball against a wall! It’s like, “where do we live? Rio?”

9. Never watch any MLS games. You will mysteriously get dumber about soccer.◊

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