OUT OF THIS WORLD
One more day until four more years. The World Cup can’t end soon enough.
I’m just not feeling this whole World Cup thing.
It’s the only sport where the announcing is more exciting than the action--if you’re tuned into the Spanish-language broadcast. And I don’t even speak Spanish.
This isn’t about a fan’s inability to appreciate the athleticism and the strategies. This is about a sport’s inability to agree on the right way to crown a victor, when all that is at stake is The Championship Of The World.
Nothing they do seems to make people happy. Not penalty kicks, not “golden goals” in overtime. And, of course, it seems as though almost every important game goes into overtime.
Penalty kicks are exciting and dramatic, but they have nothing to do with the rest of the game. No strategy, no defense and--for the goalkeepers--no skill. It’s strictly a guessing game. They start diving before the ball is struck and sometimes they get it right. If they’re going to decide a game this way, why not just cut right to the chase?
“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the World Cup final. Taking the first kick for Brazil will be Ronaldo.”
What’s so bad about sudden-death overtime? It works great for hockey. There’s nothing more tension-filled than a Stanley Cup overtime game, trying to imagine the pressure on the goalies asked to stop each puck that whizzes their way or else they lose.
Let the soccer guys keep going and going until someone scores.
And can we stop the Oscar competition that goes on every time two players come near each other? Someone gets a toe stepped on and he falls to the ground, writhing in agony until the referee makes a call or his team gets the ball back, whichever comes first. If I want to watch overacting during the daytime I’ll just turn to the soaps. The worst thing about it is, these bad actors could actually determine the outcomes of games.
Did you see the France-Croatia semifinal? I don’t blame you if you didn’t, but if you happened to watch, you saw France’s Laurent Blanc hit Croatia’s Slaven Bilic in the chin and Bilic react by grabbing his forehead. The referee bought it and gave Blanc a red card. All of a sudden France had to play the final minutes one man down and now must face Brazil in the championship game without one of its best defenders.
Yeah, that’s fair.
A guy flops in a basketball game and maybe the ref buys it and calls a charging foul on the offensive player. But he doesn’t kick him out of the game.
If any punishment is in order it should be for these wannabe Laurence Oliviers. They should be forced to watch “Saved by the Bell” just to see what they’re putting us through.
Don’t look for any of the sport’s flaws to be corrected by 2002.
The FIFA folks think everything is great as it is. When they met to review this tournament, they even decided not to discuss the scams and shortages that left thousands of people without tickets and the rioting hooligans in Lens and Marseille that plagued France 98. Oh, yeah, that. That’s like writing the history of the 1996 Olympics without mentioning the transportation mix-ups and the bomb in Centennial Park.
Surely FIFA figures that if all those billions of people are watching the World Cup it means nothing is wrong. We shouldn’t confuse popularity with accuracy. If the Spice Girls’ album goes platinum, does that mean they have talent?
I’m actually a little proud of the American viewing public for not flocking to watch the World Cup. It shows that just because everybody else likes something doesn’t mean that we must as well.
We all know soccer will never take off in the United States because it won’t get big network exposure, and it won’t get big network exposure because it doesn’t have any stoppages for commercials, and without commercial breaks the nation’s beer breweries can’t have ads with chanting frogs, and if the beer breweries can’t show their frogs they won’t shell out their bucks.
Sorry, soccer fans. Blame it on the frogs.
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THE DAY IN FRANCE
With one free kick, Brazil’s Roberto Carlos might try the winner’s trophy on for thighs. C4
SUNDAY’S CHAMPIONSHIP
BRAZIL vs. FRANCE
Noon
Channels 7, 34
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