World Cup Fever Sweeping U.S.
LEMON: U.S. soccer fans anxiously awaiting Sunday's match against Portugal. Round two in fighting the death group -- the Group of Death, I should say. ESPN and Univision are hoping to top the 16 million viewer mark who viewers who watched last Monday's game. So are U.S. fans actually getting on the world record, world soccer bandwagon, I should say, or is this fair weather fandom? Here's CNN's Jason Carroll.</s>JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Whoever says the United States doesn't have a case of football fever hasn't been to Chicago.</s>CROWD:  USA.  USA. CARROLL: Or New York.</s>CARROLL (on-camera): How does this compare celebrating here to celebrating, I don't know, in Australia or anywhere else?</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're representing our country, we're here. World Cup. Walla (ph), let's go, Aussies.</s>CARROLL: Once again making our way through the Australian NYC bar here in New York City, it's packed. We can still make our way through here, down to the bar. We're not going to get a drink. (</s>Voice-over): In this place, on this day Americans -- actually just about everyone here -- is an Aussie. Unless, of course, you're Dutch. (</s>On-camera): Anyone rooting for the Netherlands in here? Anyone? I see some orange over there.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We will win.</s>CARROLL: You think so.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.</s>CARROLL: If you do win, make sure you make a quick exit.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes. Yes. We will.</s>CARROLL (voice-over): Early disappointment for Australia but celebrations catching on in Miami. Chile's fans rejoicing after scoring against Spain off to Los Angeles. A goalie save brining Mexico to its feet. And in Kansas City cheers for Team USA. A record 16 million viewers tuned in for Monday's match against Ghana. The U.S. team still a long shot but still in the hunt. World Cup frenzy lighting up social media. 4.9 million tweets worldwide. Watch as tweets rippled across the United States before and then after Team USA's winning goal. The hashtag #worldcup on Instagram going viral with more than 2.3 million posts. In the end, it doesn't matter if it's the thrill of victory or the agony of defeat, it's game on.</s>CARROLL: And Don, as you know, there are a lot of Italian Americans right here in New York City, so in just about an hour from now, when Italy takes on Costa Rica, that's going to happen at noon, you can imagine a lot of TV sets here are going to be tuned in for that -- Don.</s>LEMON: Anyone rooting for the Netherlands? Bueller, Bueller, Bueller. Hey, Jason, stick around. I want you to talk to John Berman with me. As with everything, the World Cup has some haters crawling out of the woodwork.</s>CARROLL: Yes.</s>LEMON: And for those of you who are already sick of soccer and just want your old Sports Center and Twitter feeds back, John Berman had this message for you. Listen.</s>JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR, AT THIS HOUR: Like billions of people, I love the World Cup. And like millions of people, I enjoy tweeting about the World Cup. So imagine my outrage when people on Twitter complained that they are sick of reading tweets about the World Cup. There's even an app now that lets you block all World Cup tweets.</s>MICHAELA PEREIRA, CNN ANCHOR, AT THIS HOUR: No way. Come on.</s>BERMAN: Really? You'd rather read tweets about the grilled cheese someone had for lunch or the cable anchor who's too conservative or too liberal or both too conservative and too liberal. You'd rather see that than tweets about a beautiful game played by beautiful people. Let's face it, they are hot. They play in front of beautiful fans in a beautiful country.</s>PEREIRA: I don't think she's playing soccer.</s>BERMAN: Now even if the answer to that question is yes, even if you don't want to read about that, you're missing a huge opportunity. Do you know how easy it is to infuriate Europeans? Just call the game soccer instead of football or football or futbol. Watch this. Soccer, soccer, soccer, soccer, soccer, soccer, soccer, soccer, soccer, soccer. You hear that? That's the sound of 1800 Dutch people throwing wooden shoes at the</s>TV. PEREIRA: No.</s>BERMAN: Or 500 Brits grunting at a language they claim to be English. All right. You can call me when you win a game, Beckham. Why would you pass up the chance to ridicule these people on Twitter? Why would you pass up the chance to share these experiences? So for all of you who don't want to be part of this, who don't want to play in this great social conversation, why don't you just lock the doors, shut the windows and play with yourselves.</s>PEREIRA: At Johnberman on Twitter. Beefydubs, I have no part of this. I can't defend you. I cannot defend you on that one. You are on your own, my friend.