Monday 16 November 2009

Soccer?

I confess I haven’t seen a full ninety-minute soccer game for  . . . a long time.  It involved Paul Gascoigne as I recall. And I think I fell asleep part way through.  As did Mr Gascoigne.

But apparently over the weekend there were grown men rolling around a Wellington pitch for ninety minutes holding their legs and hoping to catch the attention of a Hollywood agent – and at some stage someone remembered to score.  Just once. And some of you got quite excited by that.

Perhaps you could explain the excitement to me?

18 comments:

Unknown said...

Can't.

Glad we won, but didn't watch the game, just the goal on the news. That's the best way to watch soccer, and means you can completely bypass all the nil-nil games.

goofey said...

Different strokes for different folks Peter. I can't watch oval-ball sporst of any flavour, because to me they are boring.
The NZ-Bahrain game was great!
And there wasn't too much knee holding and Hollywood-ing.
And the final score doesn't reflect the way NZ outplayed Bahrain.

Canterbury Atheists said...

Peter, mate…

I watched the game in the pub with a bunch of ungracious ‘rugby heads’ who like you are doing, loved running down a great game by pointing-out the two incidents in the game involving simulated ‘dives’ and the lack of goals – rather looking at than the exciting pulsating game – the relevance - the passion.

This was the biggest single game of sport held in our country since we played/hosted the Rugby world-cup and the game lived up-to all the hype.

Keith Quinn, of all people, called it the biggest ever game of sport played in Wellington.

The equivalent of a rugby test in football is a friendly and no one in football gives a monkeys about a nothing-at-stake friendly.

All that counts in football is The World-Cup and to a lesser extent The European Cup so every nation on this planet waits four years for the chance to compete at the tournament – let alone win the thing.

All-Whites win was on the home page of BBC (# 1 sporting story) and CNN (# 3 sporting story) over the weekend.

Never in the countries sporting history have we seen such a passionate bunch of Kiwi’s in the same stadium.

I regret not going.

Get-over AFL’s lack of international appeal and be proud of our footballers and what they achieved on Saturday night.

See ya.

Paul.

Pro Rugby said...

I enjoy watching women's hockey than soccer. In soccer, you get all these Hollywood stunts. It's pathetic to watch men act like that (feminine way). The players or the soccer game itself may play only poofters or otherwise they should require all players to undergo a sex change so they can have artificial vaginas.

Berry said...

Well, well, I thought this post would give me a fine opportunity to post some insightful comment on Pete's psyche. Until I read the comments. Turns out this is in fact some tribal issue. C'mon guys get over it, these are just fandangling games, save your creativity and competitive pang for issues that really matter.

Ross said...

Frankly, I've never understood why you'd kick a ball away and then chase after it.

Watch a soccer game, they do it *all* the bloody time.

:-)

Canterbury Atheists said...

Ha bloody typical.

All petty jealous Rugby fans can do is to run-down football.

If you have never been to a proper football game you have never experienced what it is like being a ‘real sporting’ crowd – like say Wellington put on Saturday - and I’ve been to a Rugby test in Cardiff.

You can not beat the atmosphere at a game of football.

So all you ‘rugby heads’ continue to sit like cardboard cut-outs in you seats at stadiums to watch so-called Rugby ‘tests’ (read friendly) Stadiums with less atmosphere than the moon, and chant like a downs-syndrome sufferer “All-Blackssssss” whilst the passionate Kiwi’s who know how to really support their team do their own thing.

Or sit-down with your cup of Milo in the middle-of-the-night and watch a dire game like Italy-All Blacks on Saturday (5 minutes to put-down 1 scrum!) where no one but the ref knows what is happening with the rules.

Football fans know we aren’t missing anything,


PS: Despite being the owner of an artificial-vagina (by default) I as a he/she managed to play rugby in a team with Jock Hobbs and Robbie Deans and Craig Green. The day they got rid of rucking was the day the sport became the unwatchable mess it is today.

The Tomahawk Kid said...

It is (or should I say Used to be) a game that - unlike all the other pretend and imitation versions of what some ambiguously call football - involves a great deal of skill and strategy, as opposed to brute force, ignorance and the less possible brain-cells the better.

I played the game to a very high level, and also coached schools of excellence (I coached Rory Fallon for a year) but I have given up on the beautiful game, and stopped having any interest in it whatsoever.

The rules do nothing to prevent cheating and only foster it, and those in charge have done nothing to counter this.

The game is for cheats and is a farce and a disgrace now and I have no time for it.

I dislike the Aussies winning as much as any good kiwi, but What did it for me was when Australia were knocked out of the last world cup by the Italians who had to resort to cheating in order to win - The Aussies were all over them. I was ashamed of the game from that moment on.

The game needs a video ref, and a sin bin. Every pretend dive or petty foul should have a player removed to the sin bin for 10 minutes. When you have only 10 men you cant afford to lose another, so the petty diving and fouls would end. If it didnt end, this would result in more goals which would also liven the game up for those with attention deficit disorder like PC :-)

This would not alter the rules of the game - just the penalties for cheating.

Alex said...

Peter, stick to your excitement over Aussie Rules "world" cup, or over the "grand" AFL final.

Leave football to the other 4 billion people.

Alex said...

And by the way, Peter, would you care to enlighten us how much goverment money does the "most libertarian" sport receive?

Andrew B said...

I watched the soccer at 8am in Milan with a bunch of rugby heads in a soccer pub. We cheered the All Whites and were (largely) not ungracious but the fact remains you won't find guys doing the effeminate dives in rugby or AFL. In those games you don't give an inch. (And I think you'll find PC's "over it" about AFLs less popular following, he still loves the game - perhaps you should get over it.)

I then went to the San Siro and watched the most boring game of rugby I've ever seen with the only Kiwi in sight where we were seating being my mate next to me. We sang the NZ national anthem so strongly the Italians were turning around from the tier below us those nearby were reaching across rows to shake our hands. We then sang the bits of the Italian anthem that we knew and drew smiles and applause from those around us.

We cheered when the All Blacks and Italians played well and stood on our feet on a few rare occasions as trylines were threatened. We also joined the Italians in disgust at the All Blacks kicking penalties when 11 points up. It was a great atmosphere - aided albeit by the magnificent stadium.

I'm a prop and I found the last 10 minutes (which we had a bird's eye view of) boring. But with the good people around us it still beats the hell out of watching soccer.

Get a taste of a real football atmosphere, should I? Ummm, no thanks. I live in Millwall.

Andrew B said...

PS They only got rid of rucking when some marketing oik from News Corp said it would make the game more marketable to women and people from countries where it's not played. NZ, to its credit, was the only major rugby nation to oppose the change

Sus said...

"No thanks. I live in Millwall".

Brilliant! (If those fans are still as awful as they were 25 yrs ago, I don't blame you!!).

I love soccer .. it's virtually the same game as hockey which I played and still love watching. Followed the English league for yrs (in spite of the girly theatrics), but not so much these days. I'm thrilled for the All Whites' success.

But I laughed out loud at your note re rucking being dumped to supposedly attract more women to the game ...

My 96 year old sports-mad Nana *still* bemoans its absence. "It's what a forward was made to do!" she always said.

Spoken like a diehard Taranaki-ite! :)

twr said...

"I watched soccer for hours and I almost saw a goal!" - Homer Simpson

Sus said...

Tee hee, Homer!

Although a bit rich coming from the country whose national code has hour-long games that go for three hours and feature a few minutes of real play? ;)

TheMetalChimpanzeee said...

To be fair, Peter, I don't understand what's so exciting about boofy blokes feeling each other up on a cricket pitch :P To each their own, mate :)

Alex said...

Andrew B,

So, no dives in rugby? How about that kiwi block who infamously "dived" out of a lineout and milked a penalty?

But you are right: effeminate dives are not as exciting as ear biting, eye gouging and head stomping.

Marcus said...

I remember back in 1982 when NZ last played the world cup. At the time there was a lot of excitement in the media over soccer.

I remember watching the news whereby Billy Connolly was interviewed. (At least I think it was him - I was only about ten years old at the time).

He was asked something like, "Do you think with rise in popularity
of soccer, do you think it will replace rugby as the number one sport."

He replied something like, "No. It took about 100 years to become what it is in NZ, and another 100 years for it to lose its popularity."

Of course the question remains ridiculous, but it was a popular theme in the NZ press at the time.

Look at Australia. They have qualified several times sequentially for the world cup, even almost making the quarter finals last time.

Is rugby under threat to soccer in Aussie? No way!