If you like your clichés corny and your stereotypes tired, you would have loved last week’s New England Revolution versus Atlante clash. The occasion was the semi-final of the North American SuperLiga, an embryonic faux Champions League pitting the four best sides from Major League Soccer and Mexico.

The competition – not to be confused with the “official” Concacaf Champions League – was dreamed up by Mexican television companies in what seemed like a good idea all round. It offers clubs from the three countries (including Canada) a chance to play the only legitimate competition in that part of the world, it allows Mexican teams to reconnect with their fans north of the border (all games are played on US soil, avoiding the searing Mexican summer) and it gives Mexican television something to show during preseason.

Except, of course, when you get games such as New England versus Atlante. Revolution’s 1-0 victory was marked by ten yellow cards and six reds, four of them after the final whistle, when the visiting team’s goalkeeper, Federico Vilar, kicked off a mass brawl by body-checking Chris Albright, the United States defender, and then striking him in the head.

When the dust cleared, three Atlante players were sent off (a further two had been given their marching orders earlier), as well as Jay Heaps, the Revolution right back.

At first glance, the game reinforced the usual footballing stereotypes. New England, reflecting the American melting pot, featured five players who were born overseas: a Honduran, a Grenadian, a Zimbabwean and two Gambians. Plus six American-born men of various ethnic descents (Nigeria, Germany, England, etc). Their head coach, Steve Nicol, the former Liverpool defender, is Scottish and they played with a British imprint: strong in the tackle, high tempo, direct.

Atlante looked quintessentially Latin. Seven Mexicans, two Argentinians, a Colombian and a Venezuelan. The football followed suit: accurate passing, lots of little flicks and – the critics would say – a tendency for histrionics and the odd bit of violent play. Indeed, it was two late nasty tackles from Atlante players that had reduced the visiting team to nine men before the final fracas. They were precisely the kind of tackles that prompt pundits to mutter “that’s just frustration” (if the culprit is a “goodie”) or “well, that’s cynical” (if he’s a “baddie”).

The biggest “baddie” on the night was doubtless Vilar, who was transformed into some kind of cartoonish villain. It wasn’t only the gratuitous bump and punch, which earned him his sending-off, that made him appear like a bad guy. It was his postmatch, conspiratorial comments on live television. Referring to the United States, he said: “This is the country where everyone and everything can be bought and sold.”

Perhaps fearing that Dick Cheney was going to send a black ops team to get him and engage in some “extraordinary rendition”, he quickly added: “I better not say anything more. This can be a dangerous country, a very dangerous country.”

Had this match been played in Europe or South America, the fallout would have been huge. Fines, suspensions, diplomatic incidents and so on. Because it was across the pond, the mainstream media paid little attention; at best they wrote it off as more “wacky soccer shenanigans”. Instead, the denouement was played out on internet message boards, where fans traded barbs back and forth.

But here’s the twist. Amid the predictable venom – Revolution fans blaming dirty, cheating Atlante, Mexican fans having a go at the referee and suggesting that their players had been provoked – there was a surprisingly limited amount of xenophobia.

For, you see, even as we in the old world cling to our national and regional stereotypes (thieving Scousers, disciplined Germans, cheating Eyeties, etc), across the pond they took it for what it was: a clash between two passionate sets of fans, not a miniature exercise in nationalism.

When someone did make larger inferences it seemed at least rooted in common sense. Such as suggesting that Mexicans – having lived in the shadow of US supremacy in most other areas – were frustrated at seeing Americans beat them at “their” game. Or pointing out that antiAmerican sentiment – born out of obvious events totally unrelated to football – was bound to spill over on to the pitch.

Either way, it was a far cry from the facile stereotyping we would likely have seen in Europe. And, in that sense, however ugly the scenes on the pitch may have been, the whole thing was rather refreshing.

Lost in translation

After beating Fiorentina in a friendly last week, Barcelona were due to fly from Pisa to Chicago on LTU, a charter subsidiary of AirBerlin, the German airline. But when the club discovered that the multilingual flight attendants – while fluent in Spanish and English – did not speak Catalan, they cancelled their arrangements at considerable expense.

Barcelona are, of course, free to do whatever they like. But, in a world where we routinely criticise the mixing of football and politics, such gestures seem distinctly out of place. It’s one thing to appoint yourselves the paladins of Catalan nationalism, as Joan Laporta, the president, has apparently done.

Quite another to demand that a German airline flying between Italy and the United States supply staff capable of conversing in a language spoken by fewer than ten million people in a corner of what remains – at least for now – Spain. Especially when every member of Barcelona’s travelling squad speaks either Spanish or English.

Thuram is a class apart

Lilian Thuram announced his retirement last week, after revelations that he may be suffering from a heart condition.

The 36-year-old former France defender leaves with 142 caps, a World Cup, a European Championship, four Serie A titles, a French Cup, an Italian Cup and a Uefa Cup. But, more than his honours, he’ll be remembered as one of the most intelligent and classy players in recent history, a man not afraid to speak out on key issues, from racism to drugs in sport.

The French FA will reportedly offer him a job, which can only be good news for the sport. Football needs people such as Thuram at the highest levels.

gabriele.marcotti@thetimes.co.uk