Personal information | |||
---|---|---|---|
Full name | Thomas Maurer | ||
Date of birth | January 7, 1960 | ||
Place of birth | Frankfurt, West Germany | ||
Position(s) | Midfielder | ||
Youth career | |||
1975-1977 | Pennsbury High School | ||
Senior career* | |||
Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
1978-1979 | Tampa Bay Rowdies | 0 | (0) |
1979-1980 | Tampa Bay Rowdies (indoor) | 8 | (1) |
1981 | San Diego Sockers | ||
*Club domestic league appearances and goals |
Tommy Maurer (born January 7, 1960) is a former North American Soccer League midfielder.
In 1970 his family moved to U.S. from West Germany, but with no local youth soccer leagues available Maurer started his while in the 5th grade. [1] He was a high school All-American, and the top high school player in Pennsylvania while at Pennsbury High School in Fairless Hills, Pennsylvania. [2] Between his junior and senior years of high school he joined 14 other Bucks County, Pennsylvania youth players on tour in France and West Germany in 1977. [3]
In 1978, the Tampa Bay Rowdies of the North American Soccer League selected Maurer in the third round of the NASL draft, a few picks after future teammates Perry Van der Beck and Sandje Ivanchukov. They were among the first Americans ever drafted out of high school. [1] [4] Rowdies head coach Gordon Jago sent him to train with the German 2nd Division side, Rot-Weiss Essen, as well as with English clubs Crystal Palace, Millwell and Dullwhich Hamlet. [5] Unlike Van der Beck and Ivanchukov, Maurer saw very limited action in Tampa, appearing only in indoor matches and club friendlies between 1978 and 1980.
After being waived by the Rowdies [6] he headed to Southern California and tried to catch on first with the California Surf, [7] and then the San Diego Sockers, [8] [9] even signing with the latter, but he never featured in a regular-season match outdoors for either club.
Years later he was recruited to coach by a former Tampa Bay teammate, Guy Newman, who was at the time the director of the Del Mar Carmel Valley Sharks soccer club in California. Beginning in 2005, Maurer served as assistant director of the club's boys program. [5] He later became director of the entire recreational program. In 2012 he began a new youth club in the region called Borussia Del Mar. [1] Maurer holds a USSF "E" coaching license. [5]
The North American Soccer League (NASL) was the top-level major professional soccer league in the United States and Canada that operated from 1968 to 1984. It is considered the first soccer league to be successful on a national scale in the United States. The league final was called the Soccer Bowl from 1975 to 1983 and the Soccer Bowl Series in its final year, 1984. The league was headed by Commissioner Phil Woosnam from 1969 to 1983. The NASL laid the foundations for soccer in the United States that helped lead to the country hosting the 1994 FIFA World Cup and setting up Major League Soccer (MLS) in 1996.
The Fort Lauderdale Strikers were a professional soccer team based in the Miami metropolitan area. They competed in the North American Soccer League (NASL) from 1977 to 1983. They played their home matches at Lockhart Stadium.
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The Tampa Bay Rowdies were an American professional soccer team based in Tampa, Florida, that competed in the original North American Soccer League (NASL) from 1975 to 1984. They enjoyed broad popular support in the Tampa Bay area until the NASL folded in 1984, after which the team played in various minor indoor and outdoor leagues before finally folding on January 31, 1994. The Rowdies played nearly all of their outdoor home games at Tampa Stadium and nearly all of their indoor games at the Bayfront Center Arena in nearby St. Petersburg, Florida. Although San Diego played indoors until 1996, the Rowdies were the last surviving NASL franchise that played outdoor soccer on a regular basis.
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The 1979 North American Soccer League season was the 67th season of FIFA-sanctioned soccer and the 12th with a national first-division league in the United States and Canada.
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