After being relegated from to the English Championship, American Abroad Marcus Hahnemann is eager to help Reading back to the top flight.  The goalkeeper spoke with Soccer 365 about the season, being relegated, his place with the U.S. national team and more.

By Andrew Rogers

How are you finding life in the Championship?

It’s been good because we have been winning games, but it hasn’t been easy. Historically it’s hard to motivate teams that have gone down, and its takes a while to get in gear but that has not happened to us. Every game is an absolute battle, and there is more expectation on us.

Is there a sense of déjà vu?

We had an unbelievable season when we went up, we never took our foot off the gas,  we never faltered. We are still trying to catch Birmingham and Wolves, but to be honest they have nothing to do with us, we can’t control what they do, we have to concentrate on ourselves and hopefully everything will take care of itself.

The league has a lot of equality, you can appear down and out and end up in the play offs….

You have to constantly remind yourself of what can happen if you are not 100%. We have been making mistakes this year, but when that has happened other players have stepped in and made the difference of covering their backs. That is the key to doing well in this league, you have to stick together. When we went up we were a complete unit, and that is what we are trying to do this year.

What are your thoughts on last season?

We went through a bad patch last season, we struggled in offensive and defense and we lost our confidence because of it, and its hard to get back. It was a really difficult time. It is hard to pin point where we went wrong, but to go two months without winning has to hurt the side.

If we got a point in any one of those games it would have kept us up. The margins are so tight, there is a lot of excitement with how things can turn around in the Championship, but in the Premier League you are playing some of the best teams in the world, in those games you make any mistake and you find yourself down 1-0. If you don’t track back on one run it can kill you.

We got punished for everything and it created a snowball effect. We stopped going into games knowing we can win.

Your performance has been strong throughout the highs and lows….

I don’t really see it like that, the team’s performance is the most important thing. It doesn’t matter how well I do if the team doesn’t win. There is a mix of emotion I guess because you are doing everything you need to do but without 3 points it has no meaning. People often talking about stats but the only thing that matters is the league position, that is what you get judged on.

Did part of you want to stay there?

Part of me wanted to leave, but I’m happy here at Reading, this is home for me and my family. I still have my shirt up on my wall from my 100th game at Reading. I think it was a huge achievement for me given how close I was to going home when ITV digital collapsed.

That for me told me I had made it as I had been a starter for 3 years. I don’t know if there was a possibility of me leaving, no one came in for me, and Nicky Hammond told me I wasn’t leaving. The other fact is in my mind I felt I failed and have to get the club back up.

So what is your contract situation?

I can actually leave in the summer, and when you think about it, it’s a bit scary. It’s daunting in the fact that I have a house in the States and here. I guess it’s a bit scary really. Hopefully something will happen. My ultimate goal is to make it to the World Cup which is the end of the 2010 season, I didn’t play in Germany but loved being part of it.

Talking of the national set up, do you still think there is an opportunity for you?

The reason I have played so few games, is the quality of goalkeepers I came through with. When I got my got my first cap, it was because Kasey Keller and Brad Freidel were playing in Europe.

The national team is a bonus, there are not too many keepers that will play more games than them. Now the next generation is coming through and they are just as good,  Tim Howard has taken on the role very well, hopefully I can fit in somewhere after that. It’s difficult because there is only one goal keeper spot.  It’s not like being a striker where you can play two, and sub when tired.

Also where as my team don’t want me to go back unless I start, its obviously different for Brad Guzan, but the way I see it is I’m getting high level experience week in week out. I’m a known quantity.

MLS has really kicked off since you were last there, when will you be going back?

It has always been the plan to go back to Seattle only my good pal Kasey is there at the moment for the next couple of years. Hopefully then that will present me with an opportunity to play there.

Andrew Rogers can be reached at andrewrogers@optonline.net