What I Write About

I write about the infinite number of intersections between every day life and the good news of the God who has come to get us.

Sunday, July 09, 2006

Last World Cup Thoughts

On Saturday afternoon I woke up from a nap and decided to surf our four and a half channels to see if there were any good sports on. I stumbled across Univision (not Unavision, thanks for your earlier gentle correction Macon) and found soccer. I knew that the final game wasn't until Sunday afternoon, so I assumed that this was a replay of an earlier game. Except that I couldn't remember when Germany and Portugal had played, and I couldn't remember who won.

It turns out this was the third place game. The home-towners won it. Way to get third place. Yet another reason why soccer will never be popular in the U.S.

In the U.S, if you're not in the title game, we don't care about you. Anyone remember who the Seattle Seahawks beat to go to the SuperBowl this past year? Me neither. And I don't care to. Heck, in six months I won't remember the Seahawks even played in the SuperBowl. If you didn't win it, we don't care about you.

There might be something slightly unhealthy in our obsession with winning and our lack of caring about who didn't win. I think that I might even like a nice third-place game in between the NFC and AFC Championship games during the two weeks of over-hype leading up to the SuperBowl. The game itself, free of all the hoopla and pressure of the Big Game, would probably be better.

But really, in the end, Americans care about winning and winners. Second place is first loser. And even an outstanding matchup is not enough to get us to watch if the only possible outcome is the bronze. This too, is part of our ethnic identity as white Americans, for good and for ill.

And about the championship game itself: I found myself strangely drawn to cheer for France. More characters (Henry and Zidane--a sad way to end a great career) and better play. Italy just held on and then won it in penalty kicks, but they were definitely outplayed.

However, here's the nice thing about cheering for France: if they win, you were cheering for them; if they lose, hey, it's France!

5 comments:

J. R. Daniel Kirk said...

Bro, I told you: the Pope is within the geographical bounds of Italy. You don't cheer against the pope. Moreover, Italy was robbed on that crappy off-sides call in the second period. It shouldn't have been in OT because Italy scored more goals.

But who cares, and when does NFL preseason start?

Andrew said...

Now Daniel, I'm not so sure about the "crappy" off-sides call. I saw the slow-mo replay, and I gotta tell you, it looked like off-sides to me. Also, you failed to mention the foul inside the box against France. You know, the one that should have been called instead of that first penalty? Anyway.

And I care.

TheDudeAbides said...

i agree with andrew, the off-side call was perfectly legitimate. and to go along with the penalty no call on Italy, what about the crappy call in the Box when Italy played Uklraine that got them the win, that was no foul!

Macon said...

I agree: that was a good offsides call.

AND, that was the absolute best head-butt I have ever seen!

I mean, seriously, who knew that a Frenchman could get so riled up? Good for him.

Though, if you're going to commit such a flagrant foul, I think you ought to ensure that the player against whom you commit it is so injured that they must be carried off of the field.

Just sayin'.

Andrew said...

I heartily agree. It was a tremendous head-butt. I mean, he had the strong approach, instead of snapping your head (like how he scored those headers against Brazil in '98 and how he almost put a second one in on Italy) it was a solid drive forward, not to mention the arms up, behind, and out for stability and follow-through.

And brandon, thanks for the back-up, man.

Sorry Danie, I mean, Dr. K. 3:1 (Germany vs Portugal)