World Cup What?

Posted by Cynical Sarah on June 14, 2006

I consider myself to be a sort of tomboy when it comes to sports. During football season, it doesn’t really matter who’s playing on a Sunday, I’ll still try to watch at least one of the games. If one of my teams is actually playing in a televised game that day, only the brave or stupid would try to rip me away from the TV.

To a lesser extent the same goes for hockey. Maybe it’s just that I love sports where people smash into each other a lot and get all roughed up. Clash of the titans kind of sports. But I’ve also been known to watch some bull riding, a little bowling and tennis.

Given all that, I just don’t get the big deal around the World Cup of Soccer. I don’t typically think of myself as the usual arrogant American type, but this is the one case where I can be lumped in with most Americans. I don’t care about soccer, and I just don’t get the hype surrounding it.

So here’s where the world gets to read about my complete ignorance of the game. I thought I’d do a little looking into it just to see if there was something I was missing. I read a little bit about the Sweden vs. Trinidad and Tobago game from the other day.

Really it only served to add to my wonder that this is a huge international sport.

First off, apparently a game can end in a tie in soccer. Not just regulation time ending in a tie score, but the game ending completely and no-one being a clear cut winner. What’s the point of even playing if it’s possible for nobody to win at all? Or even more to the point, why bother watching then?

In most sports, someone eventually wins. I can’t think of one yet besides soccer where they can end in a tie, but I’m sure there’s one out there and I don’t want a billion e-mails coming from all over telling me I’m wrong. Or maybe I do. If you know of another crazy sport that can end in a tie, send me an e-mail and I’ll post a list on here.

Even if my top sports, football and hockey, decided that a game could end in a tie, at least the actual game is interesting to watch too so I wouldn’t have to give up on it completely. I don’t always understand what’s going on on the field or the ice, but big, burly men are running around, smashing into each other and doing their best to kick each other’s asses.

From what I saw of soccer, you just don’t get any of that testosterone stuff. There’s not tackles, no checking, no fighting, no missing teeth, no extra padding because you’re going to take a beating. What there is, is a bunch of guys chasing after a soccer ball. That’s it. It’s such a gentle, and gentlemanly sport. Which pretty much translates to boring, like golf.

I was encouraged to see that players could get thrown out of the game. That meant there was some potential for excitement. But even that is all done in such a gentlemanly way. The ref holds up a red card and the offending player leaves the game. And the fouls are much less severe than say, beating the crap out of another player during a hockey game.

Here’s what I found. Players can get a red card for:

• serious foul play – including use of excessive force or brutality against an opponent when challenging for the ball such as a slide tackle from behind, or an “over the top tackle” in which a player raises his foot so the cleats could hit a player.
• violent conduct.
• spitting at anyone.
• a deliberate hand ball to deny an obvious goal scoring opportunity.
• fouling an opponent to prevent an obvious goal scoring opportunity.
• using offensive or threatening language.
• receiving a second yellow card in one game – basically if they’ve committed a couple lesser offenses, they can be thrown out.

Several of those rules just re-enforce the fact that soccer is a bit of a “wussy” sport. No spitting, no foul language and fouling your opponents to prevent them from scoring is a staple in many, many sports. But this is one of the few where  you can get thrown out of a game on your first offense for it, rather than just given a warning.

I won’t even go into the fact that the goal is HUGE, so the only real challenge in the game has to be for the goalie.
Basically what it comes down to after trying to get to know a little more about soccer, is that I prefer to remain ignorant and stick to what I know. If it makes me more like the typical, arrogant American, so be it.

- Sarah L. Polson

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