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Tuesday, July 22, 2008 @ 1:47 PM The game must go on AMF/USA National Men's Selection vs Spain Catalunia, October 2007 By Philip Tecla    1119 Views    Rating: October 11-15, 2007 Lady Fortuna definitely was not with the USA delegation on their trip to Catalonia, Spain for their two friendly games Catalonia Spain vs USA/AMF. It was one unfortuned case after the other.  To start with, the Air France airlines in New York refused 4 players to travel to Spain with our delegation of 11 players.  This is to blame to the Travel agency who never did told these players, or the manager of our delegation, that they needed a visa to land in Paris, France ( Transit to Barcelona Spain).To Spain they did not need the visa but to land in Paris they did. So we took off with 7 players and decided that the assistant coach would dress too.  This was a friendly and we did not want to jepordize the Catalonian Federation with not showing up at all, as they had already advertise that the USA would be there. Arriving in Barcelona after 14 hours of travel, we were notified that  only lugage of 3 persons did arrive. None of the players did receive theirs. No uniforms no futsal gear. The president of the Catalonion Federation made a few calls while we were driving to our hotel and got all the players a brand new pair of Nikes and also he arranged that one of the local clubs lend us their uniforms.  We did not make it to the hotel because our first of the two games should start at 8:00 PM and we left the airport for a two hour ride at 5:30 PM.So straight to the Futsal Hall. Our players did quite well for the first game and we lost 7-2. The second game, two days later, playing again with 7 players, we kept it to a 5-3 loss. The next two game were supposed to be played in the USA. The rising cost of the airlines did jepordize the games for the moment. Also the Catalonion Federation is concentrating on the First World Cup for Women which will take place in September 2008. All together a great trip during which we learned that whatever may happen The game must go on.