Few activities reveal how little we truly know about our loved ones more than holiday shopping. But sports can be a gift giver’s salvation. If you know someone’s favorite team, you can at least get them something they probably won’t totally hate. And since The Athletic exists to serve you, dear reader, we’re here to help you use that information to find the best gift (or one that’s both good and affordable) for the soccer fans on your list.
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The following are gift ideas for fans of some of the most popular teams among The Athletic subscribers.
Atlanta United
Best: Write a song about Atlanta. A song that gets picked up by radio stations and goes viral on the internet. A song so beautiful and heartfelt that, when Tata Martino hears it playing in a shopping mall, he stops, lets his Jamba Juice slip from his hand, and uses the sweater tied around his neck to wipe away a single tear as he whispers, “I must stay.”
Budget: Since they just won an MLS Cup in just their second season of existence, Atlanta United supporters are quite easy to shop for this year. So if you don’t trust your songwriting abilities, just buy a plain white T-shirt in their size and write “73,019” across the front of it in large, clearly legible digits. Not sure what that number means? Don’t worry, they’ll tell you. And they’ll be forever grateful that you’ve given them an opportunity to explain it to everyone else who asks, too.
Toronto FC
Best: Going from the best team in MLS history to finishing ninth in the Eastern Conference the very next season made 2018 a difficult year for Toronto supporters. The best thing you could do for them is to pretend like the past season never happened. When the clock strikes midnight on New Year’s Eve, wish them a happy 2018. Next summer, tell them how excited you are for the World Cup in Russia. Pay a local theater to host a “premiere” of Black Panther. It will take dedication, but the Toronto FC fan in your life will appreciate the chance at a year-long do-over.
Budget: Or you can just buy “Come On You Reds” by The Athletic’s own Joshua Kloke (read an excerpt here) to remind them that the team has overcome far worse to achieve historic success.
Seattle Sounders
Best: Behind a Waffle House somewhere in east Atlanta, there is a dumpster with a log in it. This “victory log” was driven across the country by the Portland Timbers only to go unused, allowing Sounders fans to end the year with a taste of schadenfreude after their rivals eliminated them from the playoffs in an earlier round. Track down that log and fashion it into a schadenfreude bench that your favorite Sounders fan can sit on and think about how a future generation will remember that very log as a symbol of our disregard for the planet as they gaze down on the used-up husk of the Earth from their interplanetary escape pods.
Wyoming ☑️
Nebraska ☑️Victory log is still truckin' along. #OnwardRoseCity #RCTID #MLSCup pic.twitter.com/fYetMQzTMt
— Portland Timbers (@TimbersFC) December 3, 2018
Budget: It won’t be released until March, but you can preorder “The Sound and the Glory: How the Seattle Sounders Showed Major League Soccer How to Win Over America”—a book that may or may not be printed on paper made from that log—by The Athletic’s Matt Pentz. It’ll be worth the wait.
Columbus Crew
Best: By getting to keep their team, Crew fans already got the best possible gift from the Haslam family. So you really don’t have to get them anything.
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Budget: Just tag all your social media posts with “#SavedTheCrew” and you’ll keep Crew fans smiling through the holiday season and beyond. If you really want to get them something nice, though, start a petition to name their new stadium “‘Good Riddance, Anthony Precourt’ Arena.” Since it’s being paid for with public funds, this really should be taken into consideration.
Liverpool
Best: If you could figure out a way to break Jurgen Klopp’s cup-final curse, the Reds in your life would consider it the greatest gift they have ever received, but if anyone you like is an Everton supporter, you would pretty much be condemning them to their own personal hell. So think twice before attempting to pull this off.
Budget: Breaking curses can be difficult, but staying hydrated is easy with the official Jurgen Klopp water bottle! Perfect for freshly gegenpressed juice.
(Liverpool FC)
Arsenal
Best: Many of us take the reliability of our favorite holidays for granted. Each year we know exactly when they will be celebrated. But the timing of Arsenal fans’ favorite holiday is far less certain. In fact, over the last several years, it hasn’t arrived at all. Unless you’re Harry Kane, there probably isn’t much you can do to ensure the return of St. Totteringham’s Day, but you can make a lasagna and let your favorite Arsenal supporters reminisce about St. Totteringham’s Days past. They will appreciate it.
Budget: What Gunner wouldn’t want to receive Arsenal Guess Who? It combines a classic game with unflattering caricatures of Arsenal players— just like an ArsenalFanTV video filmed after a loss, except without the second-hand embarrassment. However, with players like Theo Walcott and Alexis Sanchez included, it might be more of a “Guess who’s still on the team” game.
(Arsenal FC)
Spurs
Best: There are so many gifts you could give to Spurs fans this holiday season. You could send a reliable construction crew to north London. You could give Daniel Levy the money for January reinforcements. Or you could try to find a talented midfielder who is also a licensed electrician.
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Budget: Though it might be taking the “budget” tag a bit too far, if you want to give the Spurs fan in your life the gift of befuddlement, pick up the Spurs-APOEL friendship scarf. Nothing says “here’s a thing” quite like a scarf commemorating an utterly forgettable Champions League group-stage match on Dec. 6, 2017, that has been marked down twice to £3.00.
(Tottenham Hotspur)
Barcelona
Best: A Ballon d’Or recount. Because the fact that Leo Messi finished fifth this year WAS A CRIME AGAINST NATURE.
Budget: I’ve got four words for you. Leo. Messi. Foot. Bubbles. Just watch:
U.S. men’s national team
Best: Until recently, the best gift you could’ve given the USMNT fan in your life was a new coach, but the USSF finally took care of that. The second best thing you can get them: a conversion van with Christian Pulisic’s America tattoo airbrushed on the side.
Craziest thing about Pulisic's shoulder piece? It's not a tattoo. It's a birthmark. pic.twitter.com/vfJHS8lcSE
— Matt Ufford (@mattufford) October 7, 2017
Budget: The U.S Soccer camouflage hat is the perfect gift for any fan of the men’s team, just in case the federation’s narrow, drawn-out, and possibly nepotistic coaching decision doesn’t pan out. This hat gives the person on your list the option to disappear into the woods and live a life blissfully unaware of World Cup qualification cycles.
U.S. women’s team
Best: Since the 2019 Women’s World Cup is in France, what would be better than an all-expenses-paid, month-long (hopefully) trip to support the U.S. in the land of wine and cheeseburgers? An all-expenses paid, two-month-long trip to support the U.S. and then celebrate/mourn on the French Riviera, obviously.
Budget: The National Team: The Inside Story of the Women Who Dreamed Big, Defied the Odds, and Changed Soccer by The Athletic’s Caitlin Murray can now be pre-ordered, and it’s going to be a must-read for any USWNT fan. But that won’t arrive until April. In the meantime, there’s “Alex & Me”—a film starring Alex Morgan as herself. Wikipedia describes it like this: “After being cut from the team, Reagan calls a number of clubs, but all spots have been filled. While tearing down a poster of her favorite player Alex Morgan, she fall (sic) off a chair and hits her head. When she comes to, she sees Alex Morgan in her room but thinks it’s just a hallucination caused by the fall. She accepts she is the only one that sees Alex and they begin to train together.” How could anyone not want to watch this movie? How could anyone not want to own this movie? It’s available on Blu-Ray/DVD and you should give it to everyone on your list, whether they’re a fan of the USWNT or not.
As thrilled as your loved ones would be to receive anything listed above (particularly the Foot Bubbles, of course), the greatest gift you could give any sports fan on your list is a subscription to The Athletic. You can give the gift of a three-month, one-year, or two-year subscription here. And if the person you’re shopping for is already a subscriber, give them something you can be certain they’ll want by extending their subscription. You don’t have to wait for shipping, it doesn’t need to be wrapped, and if they already have it, it means they’ll appreciate it that much more. Gifts don’t get more perfect than this. Well, this and “Alex & Me.”
(Top photo: Marc Atkins/Mark Leech Sports Photography/Getty Images)
Brooks Peck is a managing editor for U.S. soccer at The Athletic. As co-founder and editor of the award-winning blog Dirty Tackle, his work has previously appeared on Yahoo Sports and in Howler Magazine. Follow Brooks on Twitter @BrooksDT
