Pensees: The World Cup, The Game, and A Burden for Souls

The World Cup, The Game, and A Burden for Souls

I must move on. My Cup ended with the headbutt. Anybody who knows anything about soccer knows that France outplayed Italy the entire second half. Admittedly, the penalty kick in the first six minutes was doubtful. But even the Italian side didn’t dispute it too loudly. They know themselves. They’re thugs. My friend, Ben Wright, rightly called the Italians to win it all. Congratulations to him. (I was pulling for Spain). But the Italians didn’t play well in the last game. Even Ben has to know that.

I have commented on Zinedine’s antics here and here (see comments on Portugal v. France). More later. Perhaps. I’m sad that France lost, but glad that Zizou got the card. But it really hurt when I was told that Franck Ribery, the ugliest player on Les Bleus, reminded people of me. I express my complete bafflement at Nachos and Dip.

One sportswriter made this remark:

This World Cup should silence those who continue to believe world-class soccer is for suburban minivan types, usually referred to as “pansies” or other more colorful colloquialisms. Between Zidane’s head butt, Wayne Rooney’s testicle trample, and Daniele de Rossi’s surgical opening of Brian McBride’s face, Germany 2006 was the real thing—a cruel, violent test of wills. All the talk about sissy diving misses an attendant concept. Diving happens because there is plenty of actual abuse out there. Defenders take liberties outside of the penalty area—strikers get payback by embellishing contact where it is more costly.

In the end, the whole affair is a great study in humanity. Depressing, but nonetheless instructive. The mystique of soccer is something that most Americans simply cannot comprehend yet. But they will.

As the US becomes more and more internationialized (and if you don’t think that’s a word, I’ll headbutt you), the country will become more swept up in the cult of soccer. That’s good. That’s bad.

It’s good for the game.

It’s bad because it will mean, as it has in every other country where soccer reigns supreme, that religion is completely empty. Even the Muslim world is not so obsessed with soccer. For them, religion still has meaning. However, for most of the world, the absence of religion with meaning has been compensated by the cult of soccer.

What few Americans fail to understand about European soccer particularly is that a season is not just a series of games. The entire season becomes a drama. Each game is built upon the previous game. And each team has more than one “league” to be concerned about. More on that later. A win secures three points for the team. A tie equals one point. A loss, of course, is zero points. These are carefully tallied by fans throughout the season. Fouls (those that earn cards) have more than just immediate ramifications for the current game. The penalty of it carries on. Every game becomes a game of strategy.

For example, one team may decide that playing for a draw because their star player was carded in the previous game and cannot play this game is their best strategy. They will determine the formation of the team, the actual players, and go on the pitch determined to fight for a draw. If they are scored on first, they will readjust their game, choose different substitutions (they only get three a game), and attack as hard as they can for the equalizer. If they equalize, they walk off the pitch triumphant and the other team failed.

That’s only part of it. European footballers are actually involved in several different leagues and tournamants. Each country has its national leagues that are tiered based upon their performance the previous year. Obviously, the big money teams are always on the top level. Well, not always. And that is part of the mystique.

All the teams in a particular country are divided into leagues of about twenty or twenty one teams per league. The top league consists of the top twenty teams - duh -, but here’s the kicker. Each week the rankings in the league are published based upon the point system. The bottom three teams of the league will get demoted to the second league (the “minors” so to speak) the following year. It is entirely possible that a professional team play so poorly that they end up playing amateurs just to climb their way back up to the prestigious premier league.

The prize for the top two teams is an invitation to the spectacular, big-money UEFA Champions League which involves 32 teams and a format much like the world cup format that begins with the teams divided into groups of four and playing each other for the best over all point tally (again 3 for a win, 1 for a draw) just to enter the knock-out phase. This, however, is not done in one month like the World Cup, but is done throughout the season. So, while last year’s champions are busy preparing for the prestigious UEFA Champions League games which come sporadically through the season, they are also busily maintaining their standing in their domestic league.

Teams that don’t make the UEFA Champions League of 32 teams from all over Europe, may make the UEFA Cup league. The competition for the coveted cup starts with sometimes up to 80 professional teams from all over Europe who have qualified by doing well in their domestic leagues.

In the meantime back on the ranch, small-town club teams actually get to compete in a nation-wide tournament that the pros are obligated to be a part of just to maintain their dominance. There is no ivory tower isolation from the regular guys. And, believe it or not, it has happened - I remember - when a highly motived THIRD league domestic team made it to the national championship against one of the premier teams of the land. There are little Gonzagas everywhere.

The reason why American professional soccer will never really take hold is because it has the elitist isolation of the other pro sports. Soccer is a grass roots sport. If the American pros really wanted to increase their chances for big money, they would recognize this cultural phenomenon and condescend to actually fighting to maintain their status in the top league over small clubs. I don’t think the American organizers get it.

The culture is amazing. The game is pure. No time-outs. Few substitutions. Just two teams slugging it out. Any goal - just one - is devestating. It’s like watching a duel between two men with daggers. They are holding each other’s wrists. It’s intense. If one manages to cut the other, it’s serious. Thus, the extreme emotional cheering for the GOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAL! The ramifcations of that one point may extend beyond that one game. The goal may actually mean THREE points. The equalizer may actually mean ONE necessary point to advance the team in its league. It’s the culture that makes it intense. It’s not boring.

Boring is a professional basketball game. Set your head in typewriter motion and watch the ball go back and forth. In the last five minutes engage your brain. It’s serious now. Boring is watching professional teams forever secure in their status in the top league playing bad ball. Just imagine what would happen to the NBA if the bottom three teams were relegated to a lesser league. Just imagine what would happen to the lesser league (What is it?) if the top teams could get a chance to compete with the big boys.

In the meantime, the best players from each country are playing on a representative team from their country in a four year long tournement that starts with scores of teams and culminates every four years with the top 31 teams and the host country. That, as we all know, is the FIFA World Cup. World Cup competition starts already next season.

Go to a pro game in Europe and, if you don’t get burned by the flares, you will never experience anything like it. Even if the result is a 0-0 draw. A draw is never a tie in the purest sense. One team or the other is walking away victorious. And the crowd experienced the tension the entire time. Riots often happen. There is an increase of wife-battering during the competitions. Suicides occur. The tension is real. It’s not just a bad season at stake. It could mean a bad couple seasons.

But soccer is a religion. And that is the sad part. It is its unique organization, it’s playability (if you don’t think that’s a word I’ll headbutt you), and the inexpensiveness of the sport (you can play soccer with a stuffed hat) that makes it everyman’s sport. The connectedness that the average footballer in Europe senses with the premier teams of the nation is due to the oneness they feel by being a part of the same competition. They may hate the pro team with perfect hatred on the domestic level, but even if they got beat out by the hated team, they will pour their life’s blood in support for that team in the UEFA championships. That team, after all, represents their country. So, the weaving of many threads continues. And it obsesses the mind.

But what else is a mind that has no God, no church, and no hope to think on? Soccer gives fellowship. Soccer gives emotional release. Soccer gives a future. It always gives a future (in their clouded minds anyway). Soccer gives something to think about. In lands where apathy is drilled into the psyche of its people as a virtue, soccer gives reason for hate and for love. Intense hate. Intense love.

When Zinedine headbutted the evil Maturazzi (I say that with sincerity. Maturazzi is wicked), the failure of soccer as a religion was as clear as it could ever be. Here was a man who rose like a phoenix out of the rubble of Marseille’s projects to unspeakable wealth and unmatched talent and recognition only to be unable to restrain his temper at the very peak of his matchless career. He walked off the pitch, head down, tears in his eyes, betrayed by his god. His god had cruelly tricked him and made a fool of him. His god gave him great powers with a football and all kinds of promise for a happy life, but left him utterly powerless against his own flesh. In his moment of glory, Zizou walked away a defeated man, no better off than the millions that watched him.

It was fitting that the nearly one billion fans who watched be disappointed. It had to happen. In a sense countless millions were betrayed by soccer as well.

Does Zizou know that the mind set on the flesh is death? Does Zinedine realize that only the mind that is set on the Spirit is life and peace? Or, is he set for a long retirement wondering what happened or trying to relive the glory days of times past? Does he secretly fear that when the numbing opiate of soccer begins to wear off over time that he will find himself even more conscious than ever before of his complete bondage to sin? Will he ever realize that his god made a fool of him?

I wonder. And my heart aches not just for him, but for the millions that flock to their temples week after week after week.

And that’s the real reason the Cup ended on a sad note for me.