I went to some World Cup games back in '94. I was at one of the biggest U.S. wins ever, the one over Colombia. I was also at the Colombia win over Switzerland, a few days later.
These happened to be the last two games Andres Escobar ever played, as he was killed a few days later, in what most people think was some sort of retribution for knocking in the winning goal for the U.S.
I just saw a story on ESPN about rampant racism in European soccer, where fans openly ridicule black players, call them monkeys, tell them to go back to Africa, and throw bananas and peanuts on the field. (FIFA is finally promising to crack down on it, having previously relied on national organizations to solve the problem, though it remains to be seen if this will be effective.)
(It was noted that this is primarily a Spanish problem, not a continent-wide problem ... I did not mean to imply it was a problem all over Europe, only that in Europe, there is a problem. It is isolated to certain areas, but where it is a problem, it is a significant one, with hundreds or even thousands of fans participating.)
The World Cup begins this week! Get your game on!
-Dom
Re:Bloody Hell
RoMo on 2006-06-05T11:05:02
Someone told me fifaworldcup.com is using perl (and php):o) Re:Bloody Hell
pudge on 2006-06-05T14:12:04
"farce"?
You sure you know what that word means?Re:Bloody Hell
Dom2 on 2006-06-05T16:11:39
Like most people, I only have intuitive definitions. So, turning to my trusty dictionary, I see:Which sums up pretty nicely my impressions of soccer.1. farce n. a comic dramatic work or genre using buffoonery and horseplay and typically including ludicrously improbable situations.-Dom
Re:Bloody Hell
pudge on 2006-06-05T16:28:30
Which sums up pretty nicely my impressions of soccer.
Sure, I was just (perhaps clumsily) pointing out, with an attempt (again, perhaps clumsily) at humor, that lots of people disagree with you, and there should be nothing wrong with that. Granted, I am not inundated with World Cup talk here in the U.S. like most of the rest of the world, so perhaps easier said than done... but OTOH, every one of my coworkers for like a year was playing WoW nonstop, and I managed to tune that out. :-)
Re:Bloody Hell
Dom2 on 2006-06-05T18:41:43
In fairness, I was trying to be humorous as well (badly!). I don't have any real objections to football itself -- just the saturation bombardment that I'm exposed to everywhere I go.Tuning out WoW is even harder though -- my wife has been completely addicted for > 6 months... Thanks for putting thinsg into perspective!
-Dom
