Soccer Sucks – Almost

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Soccer Sucks - Almost
‘Pros’ and cons of World Cup soccer ‘action’
“Rooney stomping foe’s crotch a rare joy in watching soccer”
Pete McMartin, Vancouver Sun, July 8, 2006

I don’t want to boast. Well… okay, I do. I scored Friday. It was lovely, really. Deserves to be on the highlight video, though possibly my wife might have something to say about that. But I got the job done. That brings the record this week to:
Me: 1.
Brazil: 0.

I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking: Hah! One!

But even that fairly tepid record would have been enough to propel me into the World Cup semifinals – or, as they are otherwise known, Europe – whereas Brazil, while populated with allegedly talented soccer players with names like (and I am not making this up) Kaka, must return home to Rio scoreless, the only consolation being the local prevalence of thong bikinis, which you don’t see a whole lot of in Germany, unless they happen to be made of leather, and then only worn by men.

I am not, I have to say, surprised at Brazil’s impotence. Despite the fact that its players have great hair and look terrific in shorts and are so convinced of their own machismo they have cultivated an egomaniacal penchant for single names, Brazil, unlike myself, must compete in a sport not exactly designed for scoring, though you have to wonder how the best professionals in the world can consistently miss a target 192 square feet in size. I don’t have that problem.

There is also this other disadvantage about soccer: (And how do I put this delicately, so as not to inflame the great game’s many fans?)
It sucks. (I should clarify that. It sucks to watch, about 99 per cent of the time. It has its moments. For example, Wayne Rooney putting the boots to the crotch of that little Portuguese whiner was a joy to witness. As a Canadian brought up on the hockey notion of an eye for an eye and then some, it was a joyfully visceral moment. But then Rooney is that rare soccer player North Americans can relate to, an athlete who doesn’t perform Swoon Lake when love-tapped by an opposing player.)

I love playing the game. I can appreciate the great skill and endurance needed to play it at the top levels.

But come on! Nil-nil? In a world championship tournament? That’s not a score, it’s Waiting For Godot. It’s coitus interruptus. (I found a quote on the internet: “Soccer is like 90 minutes of foreplay, followed by two weeks of, “Wow, that was almost good sex.”).

As one colleague said to me recently, as much as he has tried to watch an entire World Cup game, he would rather have hot pokers shoved in his eyes.

I know that many, many people in the rest of the world would oblige him for saying that, just as there are many people in the rest of the world who believe I am not only wrong about soccer sucking, but that I am a wretched, ignorant boob for saying so.
That’s fine. Sticks and stones...

But I’m also not alone. As the NHL is only too acutely aware, many people still prefer to watch NASCAR and professional poker rather than something as gratifyingly vicious as hockey, much less soccer, which has the added disadvantage of being played by athletes with gelled hair.

There are also several websites devoted to the sucking-ness of soccer. One of the more virulent is www.soccersucks.net. Among other things, it insists that any sport that France is successful at should be considered suspect; that soccer highlights concentrate on what almost happened (in the absence of anything really happening); that soccer players act like they’ve been shot, whereas real athletes will play with pain; and that penalty cards are “fruity.”

As for its tempo, it had this to say: “Soccer is absurdly slow, I’ve had soccer apologists say with false pride how the average soccer participant ‘runs’ four miles in a game. News flash: that means they are jogging less than three miles per hour.”

In short, I would say that having to endure 90 minutes (plus added-on time) of guys who look like hairdressers futilely kicking a ball around makes soccer the most tedious sport to watch.

Other than baseball, of course…

27-May-2012

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