Category: soccer Page 2 of 3

Reading this FiveThirtyEight article on the advancement (or lack thereof) of the women’s game (written prior to last night’s US-Thailand match), this caught my eye:

For Thailand, South Africa or Argentina, a win in the group stage — or even a goal or two — can help raise the profile of women’s soccer back home.

People rightly celebrated Argentina getting their first-ever World Cup point from their 0-0 draw with Japan. Hopefully that does raise the profile of the Argentine side back home.

But it also occurs to me that Thailand getting absolutely, completely, record-breakingly demolished by the US could serve to raise their profile, too, if in a different way. I don’t mean to claim the US purposefully hammered them for this reason; it’s certainly a silver-lining point of view. But just imagine what the heads of the Thai football association must be saying to each other today. Or even the heads of FIFA itself, as they prop up their feet on stacks of money and sip cocktails garnished with hundred-euro notes.

Maybe it’s something like: Ouch. What can we do to help keep that from happening again?

Nice story by Roger Bennett, of “Men In Blazers”: HELLO, WORLD – Soccer in the U.S. doesn’t need a team in the World Cup. It’s already here to stay:

So even without the Yanks in Russia, America will be watching. Yes, we will be deprived of giddy collective moments such as when Landon Donovan smote Algeria, but take it from me, an Englishman, whose team failed to qualify for two World Cups in my lifetime — in Argentina 1978 and in the United States in 1994 — that won’t ruin it at all. Those tournaments turned out to be the two most enjoyable World Cups of my youth. Being able to watch and savor without the impending failure of my team hanging over the whole thing was like being freed from a sporting Sword of Damocles.

This your permission note, then, to cut work for a month, America. Do what you do better than any nation in the world: Savor the circus. Slink out of your cubicles en masse. Day drink. Watch, revel and inhale the World Cup in its full glory. It is the world’s greatest telenovela, replete with Ronaldo, Messi, Neymar, heroes, villains, echoes of wars past, dodgy haircuts and Fortnite goal celebrations. And it will be on televisions across our nation. Even in the rural bars of Maine.

Way ahead of you, Rog, on the cutting work for a month, but just as excited. Let’s go.

Another Brian Phillips Grantland post worth its weight in gold, Stop Making Sense. As always with Phillips’ writing – and I never use words like “always” lightly – the whole thing is worth your time. But basking in the afterglow of the final, and turning a brave face to the next four bleak World-Cup-less years, the passage below sums it up perfectly (note that it was written on July 3, just before the quarterfinals; thus “Germany-France on Friday”, “next 10 days”, etc.).

Every World Cup does one thing better than any other event that human beings organize. It focuses the attention of the world on one place at one moment. Around a billion people watched at least part of the final in 2010; that’s several Super Bowls. When a game becomes so ubiquitous, it almost ceases to be entertainment and becomes something else, an atmospheric phenomenon, an object of astronomy. Will more people watch Germany-France on Friday or see the moon over France and Germany? Only the Olympics brings people together like this, and hey, due respect to the Olympics. But oh man is it ever not the same thing.

And this, even more than neuron-blowing games or unbelievable outcomes, is the magic of the World Cup. Over the next 10 days, a substantial portion of the living population of the Earth will have its feelings altered simultaneously by the actions of 22 men chasing a ball around a field in Brazil. Whether you watch alone or in a group or at a stadium, you will know that what you are seeing is being seen by hundreds of millions of people on every corner of the globe, and that your joy, despair, or disbelief is being echoed in incomprehensibly many consciousnesses. Is there anything more ridiculous than this? There is nothing more ridiculous than this, but it’s an extraordinary feeling, too. When something incredible happens — Messi curls a ball around three defenders; Zidane head-butts Materazzi — it’s not just an exciting moment. It’s a bright line connecting you with the human race.

People call soccer “the world’s game”, and it’s kind of a cliché, but it’s also pretty much actually true.

I read a (typically) great post by Brian Phillips on Grantland recently, a Brazil World Cup travelogue but with Brian’s (typical) brilliant outlook: Train in Vain. Lots of good stuff in there about the national character of the country, its history, and some of the problems faced there, in light of hosting the largest sporting spectacle in the world. I recommend reading the whole thing, but the following philosophical aside really struck me.

Think of it this way: Almost every other sport tries to be exciting by augmenting human capability in some way (football pads, baseball bats, tennis rackets) or at least by perfecting it (agile giants flying toward an NBA rim). Soccer diminishes capability. Instead of making athletes superhuman, it gives them an extra problem to contend with: no hands. When a soccer player scores, she’s overcoming not just her opponents but also the absurd demand of the game itself, which tells her to be agile and then takes away the tools of her agility.

If you think of it that way, can you understand the appeal that soccer has offered to billions of people? It exploded among the poor in so many colonized countries in part, of course, because it required so little equipment. But that can’t be the only reason. A soccer player is essentially belittled by the universe. But he outwits the universe. He grins at his ridiculous problem and overcomes it through grace and guile. Soccer is the beautiful game partly because it makes beauty seem so unlikely, seem virtually impossible, and then gives players just enough freedom to do something beautiful anyway. In its best moments — which don’t happen often, which don’t occur even in every match, and which are therefore to be savored — soccer is ballet breaking out of an enforced clumsiness.

I went yesterday with a couple of Eberly’s Army buddies to catch the San Antonio Scorpions 2013 home opener, the inaugural game in the brand new Toyota Field stadium. We joined the Crocketteers supporters at both the pregame tailgate and in the stands. Aside from the home team winding up on the wrong end of the 2-0 scoreline, it was a great evening.

Following are some assorted thoughts and observations. I also took some pictures; see them in this Flickr set (this stadium map will help orient specific locations).

• The number of people at the tailgate was phenomenal. The support they have already for this team is amazing.
• The new stadium is bigger and nicer than I expected. I really like it. It has an interesting design and a very comfortable feel.
• They sell beer at the stadium! This has come to feel like the holy grail of soccer games, at least to us in Austin, where games are played at a high school stadium where beer sales are prohibited. But here’s the thing: it was all crappy mass-market stuff, Coors Light et al. I guess I’ve become a real beer snob, because although I drank it last night, it honestly made me wonder if that watery dreck is worth all the fuss.
• The supporters section was good, full and in full voice. They’re led by not one, but two, capos, who worked tirelessly all night to keep the fans loud.
• One chant the supporters had was the “I believe… I believe that…” call and response. The chant ended sometimes with the “we will score” or the “we will win” that I’ve heard, but sometimes in just, “Scorpions!”. Over-thinking this last had the three of us cracking up every time the “I believe in Scorpions” chant came along. Yes, we sure do believe in them, why wouldn’t we, the existence of these arthropods has been conclusively proven, it doesn’t take all that much faith. :-P
• My favorite chant was struck up during the introduction of the opposing players before the game: “You … may all … go to hell … I … will go … to TEXAS” (an homage, of course, to the famous Davy Crockett quote).
• For all the impressiveness of the supporters’ presence, it cracked me up to overhear more than one person call them “booster clubs”.
• What a great bargain these games are. Tickets start at $10, and parking is free. Even if you have a Miller Lite or four, that’s still not too expensive.
• When you go, don’t hit up the traditional concessions until after you head down to check out the row of food trucks behind the north stands.
• We couldn’t cheer for him out loud, but it was good to see former Aztex fan favorite Jay Needham putting in his usual solid work in defense for the Rowdies.

Conclusion: two enthusiastic thumbs up for the Scorpions gameday experience. Aztex games at House Park are great, but I look forward to the day when we have this kind of environment here in Austin, too.

The first issue of the new, Kickstarter-funded Howler magazine arrived today. I love soccer writing, so I still look forward to reading the articles. But after flipping through this first, enormously formatted and overly designed monstrosity, I’m glad I only backed them at the “get one issue” level and not the “full subscription” level.

Maybe I’m just in a foul mood after watching Liverpool play well but lose YET AGAIN (3-2 at home to Udinese in Europa League), but this thing just isn’t my bag. A couple of quick examples of what’s put me off:

Like this sort-of, kind-of funny picture of Rooney and Kompany that’s part of the article title? Fooled you! It’s not part of the article! At all! It’s just a sort-of, kind-of funny picture, all by itself! The text to the left is the end of the article prior! No caption (just the title, “Gents”, and the artist), no accompaniment, no point. It’s Art, I guess! (Also, how about that giant red bar? A capital “I”? Maybe! A random red bar? Yes! Relation to anything at all? None!)

Know what this diagram of Bs, Ds, and Gs is meant to illustrate? Fooled you again, it’s not a diagram at all! It’s the title of an article! Called, “BDGB BDGB”, OBVIOUSLY! It’s about being a fan of Man U in the 70s, OBVIOUSLY! More Art, I guess! (Also, see the random circles and lines and colored bars and shadows sprinkled haphazardly all over? Still more Art, apparently!)

Anyway, as I recall they did say in their Kickstarter promo, with all fair warning to me, that they would have “some of the most striking art and design you’ll find in any publication being made today”. And there are some neat graphics in here, certainly; some that even seem to serve a purpose beyond their creator showing off to other magazine/design people. And I am optimistic about the writing, but I’m disappointed overall. Best of luck to you, Howler, but I won’t be subscribing.