A motorcade of police cars with flashing blue lights and a massive, unmarked FIFA bus has announced the arrival and often rapid departure of the US soccer team in Hamburg over the past week. But when the American players are on their own, it's a different story.

On Friday, star midfielder DaMarcus Beasley sat, blissfully anonymous, at a sidewalk café outside the Americans' well-guarded hotel in downtown Hamburg. A group night out by some of the team early in the week warranted only brief mention in the local paper.

The contrast is typical of the US soccer story. Individually, the players are unknowns, their limited impact on the top European leagues ensuring them the sort of privacy their opponents in their World Cup group matches can only dream of. But as a team, the US is slowly making the rest of the world sit up and take notice.

"We're not expecting to take anyone by surprise this time around," said Brian McBride, the team's go-to goal-scorer who will be playing in his third World Cup.

Their impressive showing at the last tournament in 2002, which began with a 3-2 win over Portugal and only ended with a defeat against Germany in the quarter-finals, raised eyebrows abroad. At home, it added to the profile of a sport that has struggled mightily for attention in a crowded field of spectator sports.

“We’ve gained some fans that didn’t have anything to do with soccer and that’s, obviously the hardest person to get,” said Eddie Pope, one of the team’s central defenders and a veteran of two World Cup campaigns. “I think before we weren’t getting those guys at all.”

Bigger buzz

This time around, with a difficult group composed of the Czech Republic, Italy and Ghana looming, the prospects for advancing past the group stage are far slimmer. The buzz, on the other hand, is far bigger.

The soft drink Sierra Mist, Nike and Gatorade each produced feisty, inspirational ads around the team. The close to 15,000 fans expected to travel to Germany this year to support the team is more than in the past two World Cups combined. Broadcasters ESPN and ABC announced shortly before the beginning of the tournament that they would televise the World Cup in its entirety, and analysts say the better time difference between Europe and the US should guarantee record numbers of viewers.

“This has easily been the most attention received going into the World Cup,” said Jim Moorhouse, the team’s press spokesman in Hamburg. “Everything from advertising opportunities to just the general awareness going into it.”

With the pressure building, the US team no longer finds itself in the role of the scrappy underdog hoping to make a couple of nice impressions before quietly exiting the first round. “The expectations, they have to be higher,” said Eddie Lewis, a defender who also be making his third World Cup appearance. “We had a good tournament last time and we’re certainly getting better as a team.”

Good news, seeing as how it will be as an ensemble that America has its greatest chance. Though the American professional league, Major League Soccer, has proved a competent shaper of young talent and the number of players in Europe has grown, the US team doesn’t have anyone that comes close to matching the star power of the Czech Republic’s Pavel Nedved, Italy’s Francesco Totti, or even Ghana’s Michael Essien.

Strong defending

In their strong World Cup qualification run, the United States has relied on a strong defense anchored by US Player of the Year Kasey Keller in goal and the veteran midfield talents of Claudio Reyna. Beasley and star Landon Donovan, US soccer’s poster boys, provide dizzying speed and explosive skill when the team wants to counter-attack.

That pace will match up well against the Czech Republic’s similarly fast midfield of Tomas Rosicky, Nedved, and Karel Poborsky, said Reyna. As far as the rest of the opening round matches are concerned, the US team’s well-spoken captain preferred not to speculate.

“We want to relax and have fun and play aggressive,” said Reyna. ”We don’t want to worry about being timid or anything. With three games, you have to give everything.”

So how much is the growth of the sport at home hinging on those three games? For all the impatience of US soccer fans, the sport’s officials and US players say things must continue on a slow and steady level. Learning from the mistake of the North American Soccer League, which attracted stars like Pele and Franz Beckenbauer before flaming out in the early 1980s, US soccer has preferred to build on the foundations of the World Cup of 1994 and the MLS without setting unreasonable expectations.