It’s hard being a fan of the US national soccer teams while having to work a 9–to–5 job. It means that in the days leading up to big games, like tomorrow’s Super–Duper–Clásico vs. Los Tricolores of Mexico, you have to spend large amounts of time either surreptitiously scanning for tidbits of news to satisfy a voracious appetite for anything to encourage your hopes, or worse, make you reach for your stomach/nerve–soother of choice, often without enough time left over to keep it all in perspective.

The author and his favorite two young American soccer fans

Throw taking care of small children into the mix and you’ve got my time–depleted world.

Nonetheless, I’ve managed to "borrow" time from sleep, lunch, and other activities that do not completely require 100% of my attention to read and index a veritable wealth of teasers that have made me a bit of a nervous wreck to be around lately, a state not helped much yesterday by the lead–in college basketball game between my alma mater 17th–ranked Missouri Tigers and the defending national champions, and always loathed, 16th–ranked Kansas Jayhawks, though I do feel much better today, thank–you–very–much.

You can browse through the complete list of articles I’ve chosen to index here minus all but one of the duplicative syndicated wire feed stories so popular in newspapers and web news sites instead of the dozens that Google News un–helpfully offers up.

Alternatively, I sifted through that list and pulled out a small set of articles below that if you read nothing else, should have you adequately prepared for tomorrow.

First things first. If you don’t already know where you’re going to be watching the game, or are curious if there are better alternatives than your 20–year–old, 9–inch black–and–white TV you rigged up to basic cable, you need to see Soccer America’s list of establishments hosting viewing parties (Where Will You Be Watching? (revised 2/10/09)) .

Frank Dell’Appa prepared a good refresher course on the history of the rivalry at ESPN (Five Key Players For The U.S. Against Mexico) . Goal.com offers a couple of thoughtful responses from members of the Mexican camp, first former national team coach Manuel Lapuente (Lapuente: U.S. Stronger Than Mexico) , and then Chivas USA’s Ramon Ramirez (Give & Go: Mexico's Ramon Ramirez) .

Ives Galarcep contributes an overview of 5 players likely to be important to the American cause (Five Key Players For The U.S. Against Mexico) , and there are profiles of two of those players, the Columbus Crew’s Frankie Hejduk (U.S. Seeks Heart Of A Lion vs. Mexico) and Standard Liege’s Oguchi Onyewu (United States vs. Mexico: Attention Getter) , plus a very insightful look at the contributions of Landon Donovan’s former strike partner with the v.2 San Jose Earthquakes, Brian Ching (Ching Adds Hard Graft To The U.S. Forward Line) .

There are many more along these same lines, but those 3 give you a pretty good idea of what’s going on in the minds of our players.

Then on the background analysis front, we’ve got Goal.com’s look at MLS’s impact on the US Men’s National Team (Monday MLS Breakdown: League Impact) , plus Yahoo’s Martin Rogers hasa good answer to the critics of the US Soccer Federation’s choice of Columbus Crew Stadium as host of this critical first match in the final round of CONCACAF qualifying for 2010 FIFA World Cup™ in South Africa. (U.S. Soccer Pays Price For Home-Field Edge)

As a bonus round for the over–achievers among the time–starved, Luis Bueno covers the situation in the Mexico camp (Doom And Gloom For Mexico? Not Quite) , and you can look at my Google Maps mashup of the hometowns of the 20 men called in by Coach Bob Bradley to training camp, though only 18 will make the game day roster (US Men's National Soccer Team February 11, 2009 World Cup Qualifier vs. Mexico Roster Map) . I always find it interesting to see the regional and other biases in a human–driven system like soccer player scouting.

For a double–bonus, you can check out a couple items near and dear to my IF Stone–loving heart, the source material of so many of the articles you’ll find: interview transcripts with Coach Bob Bradley (Quote Sheet: Head Coach Bob Bradley Addresses Media In Advance Of USA-Mexico Final Round Qualifier) , and then a few of the American players (Quote Sheet: U.S. Players Discuss Upcoming Match Against Mexico After Training) . Finally, there's the most–excellent Ives Galarcep’s Soccer By Ives banner contest winner (USA vs. Mexico Countdown: And The SBI Banner Contest Winner Is...) .

12:04 a.m. Feb 11, 2009 Postscript: And if you have the time to kill and nobody looking over your shoulder at 2 p.m. Eastern, definitely send a question in to Alexi Lalas on his ESPN.com chat or lurk in the shadows. (Chat With Alexi Lalas-Wednesday 2 p.m.) I chose to ask how long he thought it would be before a majority of the Mexican players or press would utter the words “The better team won today” instead of, “We lost, but we know we are still the better team” after losing to an American team. Tomorrow I’ll see if he has an answer to that, and hopefully on Thursday I’ll see if the Mexicans prove me mis–guided, or if they hold to their historical post–game form.

Perspective
In the end though, remember that this game really couldn’t come at a better time for either the US or Mexico. Getting this match out of the way first makes it mostly about CONCACAF bragging rights. Even if Mexico manages to upset the US at home, the odds of the American team going on to lose enough games to let not just one, but two additional CONCACAF teams slip ahead of us in the Hexagonal standings are fairly slim.

For the Mexicans, a defeat this early in the Hexagonal denies them what would generally be considered a hoped–for single point, and would earn them much abuse from the Mexican press and maybe even result in the firing of Sven–Goran Eriksson, but it would still require the same unlikely combination of two Central American teams passing them in the standings to knock El Tri from booking a trip to South Africa.