To U.S. Soccer Team, Home Field Is an Ever-Changing Thing

When the United States national soccer team plays an important qualifier against Honduras on Tuesday night, it will do so in Sandy, Utah, a suburb of Salt Lake City perhaps best known for being the home of the Henricksons, the fictional fundamentalist Mormon family on the popular HBO series “Big Love.” But in a broader sense, the stadium’s relative obscurity highlights the nomadic nature of the United States team.

Unlike teams from many countries, including each of the other five nations competing in the final round of Concacaf’s qualifying tournament, the United States soccer team does not have a permanent home.

Sunil Gulati, the president of the United States Soccer Federation, said he understood the debate and conceded that there had been sporadic talk over the years about finding the national team a permanent home.

He also noted that “we’re in the business of promoting the game” in the United States, which is a task surely helped by the national team’s barnstorming persona.

The first men’s national team match played on American soil was in 1925 at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, and since then the team has visited a variety of sites, including colleges, football stadiums and even a place named Wrigley Field (though it wasn’t the famous ballpark in Chicago but, rather, a smaller park in California).

During this year’s qualifying cycle, the United States chose as home sites suburban Denver in March (during a blizzard, as it turned out), Seattle, Sandy, Columbus and Kansas City.

That meant the United States needed to be sure the stadium was free for several days before the team arrived.

Given the buzz generated by the team’s arrival in different cities, that attempt at homogeneity figures to be as close as the American players get to a national stadium experience any time soon.