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It has been a rough couple of weeks for a top American goalkeeper and national team stalwart.

Everton Manager David Moyes said recently that Tim Howard had broken two bones in his back in an F.A. Cup match. As a result Howard will miss the next two World Cup qualifiers — Friday against Costa Rica in Commerce City, Colo., and Tuesday against Mexico at Azteca Stadium. (The injury bug also infected the women’s game: Hope Solo had wrist surgery and will be out for the first three to four months of the National Women’s Soccer League’s inaugural season.)

Yet there is little need for despair as the current American goalkeeping corps is strong, ready to serve club and country. American goalkeepers are praised the world over, loved for a combination of athleticism, shot-stopping ability and good old American ruggedness. Most observers of the loneliest position see this love affair as a recent phenomenon, a golden generation of (g)loved ones that dates to the 1990s with Tony Meola, Kasey Keller and Brad Friedel, the 41-year-old marvel who stills plays at Tottenham Hotspur.

Yet, as with much of the American soccer past, there is a much longer history, and in this case, it dates to an era when the goalkeeper simply used his bare hands.

“America Soccer Goalies Equal to Best in the World” — so read a headline in The Newark Evening News on Jan. 18, 1935.

“Goal-keeping is one department in which America does not lag behind foreign countries,” Tom Connel wrote. “Soccer followers in the British Isles as well as continental Europe are forced to admit that the native American goalies, as a whole, are equal to if not better than the best net guarding talent produced in other lands.”

Tony Meola of Kearny, N.J., who played in both the 1990 and 1994 World Cups, was not the first New York-area goalkeeper to represent the United States. George Tintle of Harrison, N.J., played in the first two official United States internationals during a 1916 tour of Scandinavia, where he helped secure a win against Sweden and a tie with Norway. A firefighter by trade, Tintle was well known for snuffing out attacks during his 15-year professional career.

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East Newark’s Jimmy Douglas played for a string of teams in the American Soccer League (Harrison New York Nationals and Fall River Marksmen, among others) before guarding the net in the 1924 Olympic Games and the inaugural World Cup, in 1930. Douglas, whom one reporter described as having “more arms than an octopus,” shut out Belgium and Paraguay during the run to the country’s best finish — third place.

Not surprisingly, in a sporting culture based on hand-eye coordination, goalkeeper was the first position to become Americanized.

“It is significant that the most brilliant goalies are good basketball or baseball players,” Connell added. “The ability to dribble and pass a basketball accurately is a distinct asset to any athlete who aspires to be a goaltender. Likewise, fielding in baseball requires alertness and a sense of anticipation that is useful in tending the nets.”

A review of the A.S.L.’s top goalkeepers during the 1930s found that almost all of them were native born and played multiple sports. For example, Stan Chesney of Bayonne, N.J., starred for the New York Americans, but before that he had played in the St. Louis Cardinals’ farm system. He also led his semipro basketball team in scoring. The Philadelphia Germans’ netminder was also a basketball star, and Joe Reder of Fall River, Mass., gave up soccer to play for a Boston Red Sox minor league affiliate. Adolph Cengia of the Newark Germans came from a family of professional acrobats.

Perhaps the first golden generation of American goalkeepers was during the 1920s and 1930s, when native-born men gained respect turning away shots and fielding crosses in both a strong domestic league and in international competition. Yet none of them were included in a recent Internet poll of the top 10 goalkeepers in United States history. Meola, who was also a baseball star and even tried to kick field goals for the Jets, carries on the fine tradition of New Jersey goaltenders in the poll, but there was no room for Tintle, Douglas or Chesney.

Howard, also from the Garden State and a high school basketball star, was on the list, but he will have to be replaced for the Americans’ coming qualifiers.

In discussing Jurgen Klinsmann’s options, Eric Wynalda said, joking, “Just pick a bald guy.” Four of the five top goalkeepers in the poll are follicularly challenged — Howard, the now-retired Keller, Friedel and Marcus Hahnemann — but the likely replacement, also bald, did not make the cut for the top 10. (Meola is the exception on the hair front, and he was notably voted as having one of the 10 best mullets in sports history.) The other Brad, Brad Guzan, is having a remarkable season with the relegation worry Aston Villa, and while he has let up a lot of goals, he is battle tested and ready to go.

Let’s hope Guzan is the next (g)loved one.

Tom McCabe teaches history at Rutgers-Newark, and he is the author of “Miracle on High Street,” which details the rise, fall and rise of a Newark prep school. He is currently working on a history of soccer in New Jersey. Follow him on Twitter.