Chicago Sting, A Team From The Second City, Was The First NASL Side in Cuba
The call came from out of the blue.
Sometime in March 1978, a Cuban soccer official asked Chicago Sting President Clive Toye if he wanted to bring his soccer team to the Caribbean nation to play an exhibition game.
Toye, who was best known as the man who signed the Pelé for the New York Cosmos, told the Cuban official that he was with a different North American Soccer League team. And there was no Pelé. In fact, the Brazilian superstar had retired the previous year. The official did not seem to care. He wanted Toye's team.
As Cosmos President in 1977, Toye had tried to set up a game between his team and Cuba. It never happened because he had been fired by the Cosmos later that season.
“I had no idea I was going to hear from the Cubans,” he said. “I had given up on that. I had never thought about it, quite frankly, after leaving the Cosmos. It was a surprise. It would be easier to say, ‘Forget about it.’ There were no flights from Port-au-Prince to Havana. There were no flights from anywhere to Havana.”
After making some quick arrangements, Toye was able to secure a plane – a DC-3 – and a pilot – and the Sting were off to make sporting and soccer history. No American pro sports team had played in Cuba since the minor-league Rochester Red Wings, when guns were fired at a baseball game in 1959.
“We were tired and we wanted to go home, but when that opportunity came, to go to Cuba we were pretty excited about it," said defender-midfielder Dan McCrudden, who was a 22-year-old rookie for the Sting at the time.
On Tuesday, the New York Cosmos will become the first American pro sports team to perform in Cuba since the Baltimore Orioles played a baseball game there in 1999 and the first pro soccer side since the Sting's visit.
The Sting's experience also included a tour of Havana.
“Before we got onto the bus, the bus driver said, ‘Do not say anything negative about Castro or the Cuban regime in general because these buses were bugged,’ ” said the former U.S. international striker Willy Roy, the team's assistant coach who went on to coach the Sting to the 1981 NASL title. “That kind of put a chill through your system.”
So did something else.
“There was a lot of unusual circumstances,” McCrudden said. “When we stayed in the hotel, the strangest thing occurred though. Behind the hotel, when we looked out our window we saw this huge thing with a cover over it. When you walked around the hotel and looked down that street, it all closed off. It actually turned out to be a missile, a covered missile.
“We knew exactly where we were and that thing was probably pointed back at the States. That was shocking. That was really shocking.”
As for the game, the Sting did not fare well; they lost, 2-0.
“The place was pretty packed, so there was a lot of fans there,” McCrudden said. “We didn't play particularly well. We were tired. They were pretty good. They were good on the ball. They were pretty quick. We gave up two lousy goals and just didn't play particularly well."
In the return match at Soldier Field in Chicago a few months later, the teams played to a 1-1 draw. Andrés Roldán gave the visitors a 1-0 lead in the 29th minute before Stefan Szefer equalized from Robert Gadocha’s assist in the 67th minute.
McCrudden called it “a much simpler game. We were in the middle of our season, so we were in top form.”
Regardless of the results, the games left an indelible memory for McCrudden, who has shared his experience with friends, family, and in speaking engagements.
“People look at me a little strange, though. They're like, 'There's no way you went to Cuba,’ ” he said.
“I think some people disbelieve that because it wasn't publicized, not too many knew about it,” he added. “It was definitely under the radar, but I'm very proud of being part of that team and very thankful to [Sting owner] Lee Stern and Clive Toye for bringing us there. For a young kid, it was just a great, great experience."
On Tuesday, it will be the Cosmos’ turn to make some history of their own.
