Sawt Falasteen - What World Cup? New York gripped by Knicks frenzy

The city is at a fever pitch as the hometown basketball team sits on the brink of a NBA Championship win -- pushing the Brazil vs. Morocco game deep into the shadows.

"(The World Cup) is going to be fun... but right now, I'm a New Yorker, so we're going for the Knicks, basketball! Let's take this win. And after that, we can think about the World Cup," said actor Robert Chen, 32, next to the Brooklyn bridge FIFA fan zone.

The MetLife stadium, in neighboring New Jersey but serving Big Apple-based World Cup fans, will face a major test of its rail link to Manhattan which has come under fire for its steep $98 price tag.

But New York was a sea of Knicks orange as the team closed in on what will be their first title in 53 years if they win the clash with the San Antonio Spurs being played away in Texas.

"Everyone is kind of craving this victory, and it's excitement in the air... it's contagious," said Knicks fan and Queens-based street cart vendor Angel Diaz, 42.

"We're gonna have to take one thing at a time, and we're gonna do the Knicks first, and then we go back to the World Cup," added Diaz who said the city would be "out of control" if the Knicks sealed the deal.

Hundreds of thousands of fans are expected to descend on central New York for the fifth game of the NBA Finals series with the Knicks leading the San Antonio Spurs 3-1.

Police turned out in force for the first four games, both home and away, and officers are expected to flood Manhattan to deter the vandalism that marred earlier fixtures.

Soaring temperatures and the threat of thunderstorms could also put a dampener on festivities.

- Knicks 'over-shining' -

In an industrial section of Brooklyn, the manager of a Socceroof indoor five-a-side soccer arena Lucas Matuszewski said that "obviously the Knicks, as they should, are over-shining" the World Cup.

"It's tough to compete with such a deep-rooted kind of organization like the Knicks," said Matuszewski, 24, as children kicked soccer balls on neat astroturf pitches.

"Basketball is so beloved in the city of New York."

Scotland fan Graeme Buckingham, 53, a fisherman from Banff, described the level of soccer fever as "poor" in New York while nearby a hawker sold Knicks championship T-shirts at the Wall Street stock exchange.

"I'd expected probably a bit more, a bit more fans. But as you see, it's basketball. They're not really into their soccer, are they?" he said as he prepared to travel to Boston with the Tartan Army for Scotland's inaugural match against Haiti.

Buckingham said that high-profile efforts by Lionel Messi, who plays for Inter Miami, and David Beckham, who played for the LA Galaxy, had failed to win over US hearts.

"Looking at New York, there was a sign there outside a pub today, Mexico v. South Africa -- Champions' League. They didn't even know the tournament."

But there were signs that businesses were bracing for a delayed onset of soccer mania.

Vanessa Whalen, the owner of the Black Bull soccer pub in Brooklyn, said "I do think it's going to get hectic and crazy without a doubt, and especially at this pub, because we're a football pub."

The convergence of hundreds of thousands of Knicks fans with football fans risks transport chaos.

While MSG is not hosting Saturday's clash it is a rallying point for Knicks fans and sits directly above Penn Station, the terminus for football fans returning to the city from MetLife.

The two fixtures also clash with festivities around the Puerto Rican Day parade on Sunday, and a gig at MSG.

H.Nasr--SF-PST