Most soccer fans in Champaign and Urbana could only watch the 2003 FIFA Women's World Cup on ABC trying to understand what playing soccer at such a level could be like. Illinois Kinesiology Professor Edward McAuley knows what it's like to play soccer at that elite level.

McAuley played five years of professional soccer from 1972 to 1976 in England and Germany while simultaneously teaching high school. A successful career of playing striker at University College in Worcester, England earned McAuley a tryout with the professional soccer team in his hometown, Corby Town, prior to the 1972 season.

"I wasn't a very technically gifted player, but I could put the ball in the net," McAuley said.

The ability to score helped McAuley make the team where he played during the 1972 and 1973 seasons. While playing in England, McAuley helped Corby Town win its league title referred to as the Anglia Cup.

After two years playing in England, McAuley moved on to Germany where he played midfield for three seasons on E.F.C. Kronberg in Frankfurt, Germany. One of McAuley's teams in Kronberg finished the season as its league's best.

Despite all the success, McAuley's mother never attended one of his games. The absence of McAuley's mother followed the practices of many parents in Europe.

"There's not the level of parental involvement in sports in Europe that there is in the United States," McAuley said. "My mother wasn't interested in soccer. My dad saw a lot of my games in college, saw me play my high school games and then he would come to my Corby Town games."

Showing an extremely different level of involvement, McAuley coached his two children as they came up through Champaign's Little Illini Club Soccer Program. During the past six years, McAuley coached his daughter Elise, a freshman midfielder at Evansville, and current Illini freshman forward Brittany Ward.

"It was more obvious, the more I understood the game, that he understood the game as well as anyone," Ward said. "Luckily, he could translate it to us and teach it to us."

During the fall 2002 season, McAuley coached Little Illini to a 28-0-2 record. Included in that season was what McAuley describes as his most memorable moment in soccer, when the Little Illini girls' under-18 team defeated Missouri's state champion, J.B. Marine of St. Louis.

Despite all the success enjoyed by the Little Illini, Ward recalls McAuley rarely commenting on his own success as a soccer player.

"He would only mention it when we would screw up saying, 'You're not me, you can't do that,'" Ward said. "He would half be serious and half be joking, but he didn't flaunt it at all, he just joked about it."

It was more than 25 years ago when McAuley finished playing soccer competitively, but he still feels lingering ankle pain from playing with Corby Town and Kronberg. McAuley said that ankle injuries ended his professional soccer career and have ached ever since.

"I have osteo-arthritis in both ankles," McAuley said. "They ache every morning when I get out of bed."

A grueling schedule of high school soccer games contributed to McAuley's ankle problems.

"(In England) there are high school teams and very good ones, but there are also separate club teams as well," McAuley said. "You could effectively play for your high school on Saturday morning and play for your club team on Saturday afternoon, which I did very often, which was very stupid of me.

"That's a reason they see lots of injuries playing at that level. I'd play high school in the morning and then I go out and play a club game in the afternoon. It's not against high school boys, it's against men."

Despite the pain and soreness, McAuley would not trade his time playing the game he loves.

"I probably regret not taking better care of my injuries," McAuley said. "In other words, I regret coming back too early after injuries. You know, hindsight is 20/20, as they say. So would I do it again? Yeah."