The strike by construction workers in South Africa, which has halted progress on World Cup stadiums due for delivery ahead of next year's World Cup, has been big news in the last few days.

While still an unlikely last resort, the thought that the World Cup may need to be moved must be in the minds of FIFA's leadership; although the striking workers union and employers are in mediation at the moment to end the standoff quickly, the situation remains critically serious on many fronts. Violence has broken out, and while the workers' satisfaction is ultimately beyond the mundane concerns of world football, the antagonistic edge that the strike has taken on is a worrying development.

Contingency plans are and always should be a part of massive events like the World Cup; with South Africa lacking enough modern stadiums to handle the tournament, and with a shaky economy at play, it would be irresponsible for FIFA to not already have in place a nation to whom it could be shifted at a moment's notice.

Conventional speculation has two nations at the top of the contingency list: England, a country with enough stadiums and the proper infrastructure to host at any time, and the United States, which possesses the greatest amount of large facilities in the world and still holds the World Cup attendance record from 1994.

Which is the leading candidate is impossible to know without a hotline to Sepp Blatter, and this I do not possess; for the sake of argument, let's assume the the United States would be first in line.

If South Africa's troubles continued long enough, and the World Cup must be moved at the "last minute", would it be in the sport's best interest in this country to be the fall back location?

I'm not so sure.

Don't get me wrong; a World Cup in the United States at any time would be a boon to soccer here. A massive a success as 1994 was, it occurred in the pre-dawn era of American soccer. There was no MLS, the USMNT had yet to become even a regional power, and millions of Americans were in the dark about the greater football world. Times have changed, and with foreign leagues gobbling up more and more converts with every passing day, the US is ripe for another gigantic soccer spectacle. The World Cup returning to the States would be very, very good. But wouldn't the effect be somewhat muted by a short run up?

Without the years of preparation that usually come with hosting a World Cup, the hype machine (and like it or not, it's a major part of our sports culture) may not get out of first gear; average Americans not in tune with soccer as a global sport wouldn't have the time to react and engage. While tickets sales would no doubt be brisk and the tournament wouldn't be in any danger of flopping, the World Cup as an event might not truly saturate all levels of the national sports landscape. Instead of what could potentially be a culture-altering moment, it would be reduced to a quirky sideshow, a last minute addition to an already packed American sports calendar.

We're a quick-fix, give-it-to-me-now, short-attention-span, nothing-is-good-enough society; with that in mind, it might be easy to conclude that the run up to the World Cup is not necessary for it be a rousing success. That's certainly true for the event itself, and I have no doubts that USA 2010 would be fantastic and would line the coffers of FIFA with countless dollars while being hailed as another example of American wherewithal. But those things are ephemeral. For the World Cup to whip a nation of soccer-haters and the unconverted into a frenzy, we need the build-up; for the effect to be generational and for it to be a reverberant echo on the American attitude towards the game, we need the time to properly "prepare".

Let the media, particularly those that rarely pay attention to soccer (all of them essentially), do their thing and over-cover every angle. Let the energy and anticipation ahead of the openers roll across the chosen cities, while sports talk radio and newspaper columnists weigh in with their opinions (good or bad, it doesn't matter). Let the world's focus slowly turn toward the United States, as the people here that already love the game do their part to spread the word to their friends and family. Give those of us already on board a chance to revel in the spotlight that will inevitably be placed on the sport here. Hell, let MLS do everything they can to leverage the interest in the World Cup to their own ends.

We need the time.

So, if South Africa fails in their efforts to resolve the workers' strike, and FIFA must decide that the World Cup can longer take place there, I hope that our English cousins are the beneficiaries. The birthplace of the game doesn't need all of that time to get themselves in a frenzy, while we need every second we can get.

All of this, of course, assumes that one of the two Cups for which the US is bidding (2018 or 2022), is awarded to us. Without that, my point is moot and I'll be the first to lobby for the World Cup to come here if South Africa can't get themselves together.