EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. – A little more than three weeks ago, on a warm California evening roughly 3,000 miles from here, an international soccer tournament wearing the label “Copa America Centenario” opened with a game between the United States and Colombia. In the seats that night at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara were 67,439 spectators, a larger audience than most any gathered to date at Euro 2016.
Copa America Centenario will be played just this once and be gone forever, to be buried in the game’s past along with such supernovas as the European Cup Winners Cup and the New York Cosmos.