Digital Alterity

I’m pretty sure I’m the only reader of this ChangeLog who bleeds Old Gold and Black, but I have to share an excellent article on the BBC web site about my playoff-contending Wolverhampton Wanderers.

It has been a rollercoaster season. At the start of the season, we were favorites to gain automatic promotion. And then we started playing mediocre football. And then teams playing mediocre football started beating us. I bemoaned my lot in life frankly. Wolves is not a mid-table team. When we lost to Albion in the FA Cup, it was almost too much to bear.

Now, we’ve quietly sneaked up into playoff range, and we’ve got a real chance at creeping our way into the Prem with a team full of hardworking veterans and youngsters instead of an overpaid team of primadonas.

Up the Wolves!

Technorati Tags: Wolverhampton Wanderers, Football, Soccer

There’s no football on TV. Yes, I know that MLS is currently playing, but coming down from the World Cup high, MLS feels like empty calories in my football diet. I’ll give it another week before I’m desperate enough to care.

Allyson and I were watching a replay of last season’s Arsenal/Liverpool match at Anfield, and the contrast between the speed and energy of that match as compared with the generally defensive tactics of this year’s World Cup were astounding. The game was played about two speeds faster. People were making runs without the ball. The teams were always pushing for a counterattack. Passes were quick, short, and direct.

There is a lesson for Steve McClaren if he’s paying attention. The reason England lost was because they played a much different game than we see every week in the Premiership. The only players on the pitch who seemed to understand that intensity were Aaron Lennon, Steven Gerrard, Wayne Rooney, John Terry, and Owen Hargreaves(1). The reason why the Premiership is arguably the finest league in the world at the same time that English chronically underachieves on the International stage has very little to do with foreign players. It has more to do with a system that slows down players used to a rapid and—one might say—aggressive pace.

McClaren has to play to the strengths of his squad instead of trying to invent tactics for a squad he doesn’t have the way that Sven did. Play the aggressive 4-4-2 that the players and fans are comfortable with. Encourage pace and energy instead of favoring a cautious approach designed to “outlast” opponents. It’s time to stop reacting to the tactics of other teams and start creating something that other managers have to react to. I want to see Italy, Argentina, and Brazil struggling to keep pace with an English juggernaut that just won’t slow down. Then, regardless of the tournament results, English football will really have arrived.

Footnotes

1. Crouchie had it in that final match against Portugal as well, but the consistency wasn’t always there. I think he would have performed much better if he and Rooney were both on the field at the same time.

Technorati Tags: Football, Soccer, England, World Cup

The other day, while I was inevitably filling my free time with reading about the World Cup, I had a bizarre creative vision of a distopian world wherein Sepp Blatter, president of FIFA, was actually the antichrist. Wouldn’t that put an interesting spin on the book of Revelations? Instead of warning us about a coming period of global persecution and war, God could really have been warning us about a corrupt and ineffectual leader in the realm of global football.

It hardly seems a stretch as I sit here stewing in my own creative and paranoid delusions. After all, no matter how many morally wounding scandals Blatter and his cronies seem at the center of, we can’t seem to get rid of him. No matter how many stupid and ineffective resolutions come flowing from the FIFA fountainhead, the man just seems untouchable. No matter how he sells out the world’s most exciting sporting event to the corporate advertising machine, nothing happens beyond a sharp increase in the size of FIFA budget with money that won’t end up in the hands of soccer federations in the developing countries that need the most help.

Does anyone actually like Sepp Blatter? I haven’t found anyone yet, but I do admittedly live in the United States of Doesn’t Give a Toss About Football, a land where we resent pretty much every authority figure we encounter. As a people, we distrust global cooperation when someone has the authority to enforce what happens here on American soil. Some doofus in Zurich can tell us how to run our game? Screw him then! Burn the witch! Spread democracy to FIFA already! I’m too busy eating McDonald’s and watching re-runs of Deal or No Deal to care about this, kid.

If only we could convince W that Blatter is actually the head of a terrorist regime, then we might be able to fill the leadership vacuum with a fan collective insurgency. Of course, pretty much any revolution would be doomed to failure. The Italians would fall over as soon as the wind blew, and the Portuguese would run over to the generals from miles away to demand nuclear strikes against God himself for allowing the wind to knock over their allies.

Return of Jesus to set up the Millennial Kingdom or just a prediction that Zizou would come back and win the World Cup? We’ll find out on Saturday.

Technorati Tags: Football, Soccer, FIFA, Sepp Blatter, Antichrist

As the ball went streaking past Robinson, I didn’t even have to see it ripple the net. I felt it in my gut. I couldn’t grieve it. This wasn’t my game. I was just some American guy sitting in my in-laws’ living room watching the scene on a fuzzy TV. These weren’t my tears to shed, so I let John Terry shed them for me. I couldn’t lie dumbstruck in the grass on the field, so I let Gary Neville lay on the pitch for me. Attachment breeds suffering, but I don’t want to let this moment go. I want the hurt. I want to bear this weight of unfulfilled potential. Let it be mine just for this moment. Let me have this terrible sting of connection. “It’s not attachment,” I lie to myself, “It’s interdependence.”

As the announcers kept talking about the next game my avatars wouldn’t be playing, I couldn’t turn away. As the camera fixed on my brethren in pubs half a world away, I felt the depth of our collective presence and the temporary despair. This isn’t the way the story goes. Won’t someone just shut off the images and leave us disconnected in private grief with no pornographic images of shirtless and celebrating Portuguese to remind us of what we lost. The images kept us all focused on this terrible moment. A stadium full of silent Englishmen stunned from fevered singing to pale silence. David Beckham consoling a despondent John Terry. The carpet in my in-laws’ living room. The England shirt on my chest. The tears that aren’t mine for the country that isn’t mine either.

Attachment breeds suffering, but in this moment, this is all I’ve got. I’ll never be fit enough to be wearing the boots and the shirt. I fear in the moment that I’ll never see London again. I fear that I’ll never belong to this country that I so love. I fear that all my dreams crumbled in that terrible silent moment when that ball hit the back of the net.

England matters to me. The government doesn’t matter to me. The buildings don’t matter to me. The land on which all of that is built matters to me. I feel keenly that this is where my people came from, and I want to do just what bigots have been telling American minorities to do for hundreds of years. I want to go back where I came from. This defies logic. I know that I’m an American by birth, but these men represented my home in a way that the boys in red, white, and blue never did and never could.

But even that is a convenient lie. I’m not English. I’m Scottish. I’m Irish. I’m other things that I insist on ignoring.

For a moment, I was more than just my own five senses and experiences. For a moment, I was David Beckham on the sidelines watching something I couldn’t even influence. For a moment, I was Sven, consistently taking a safe conservative approach instead of reaching for my dream. For a moment, I was Frank Lampard, struggling to make just one of my opportunities actually work for a change. For a moment, I was Wayne Rooney, failing to control my temper. For a moment, I was John Terry, mourning for lost dreams.

Attachment breeds suffering, my inner buddha nature continued to assert, and I could feel it all starting to slip away.

Technorati Tags: Football, Soccer, England, World Cup

I have started using the following word in my conversation starting today.

Ronaldo (noun). An overweight or obese person’s stomach.
He let himself lapse a lot since college. He stopped working out, and now he has a little Ronaldo.

The joke never gets old, people.

Technorati Tags: Humor, Football, Soccer, Ronaldo, World Cup

Dammit. Why couldn’t Argentina choke in the group stages of the World Cup twice in a row? They’re looking the way everyone predicted Brazil would be. 6-0, people. I don’t care if you’re playing the People Democratic Republic of Buttfuckistan; if you can beat any team that qualified for the World Cup in a six-goal clean sheet romp, you’re automatically regarded as a favorite to win the tournament.

But frankly, I don’t like Argentina. I blame a number of factors:

• Diego Maradona. Rusty Haskell doesn’t like people who refer to themselves in the third person. Rusty Haskell knows that Diego Maradona had this annoying habit during his drug-hazed playing days. Beyond that, the man is a cheater.
• Their kit. I can’t stand it. It’s baby blue and white. And striped. I can’t imagine being proud to wear their colors.
• The continent on which they live. South America is the continent that I least want to visit ever. And, yes, I’m well aware that this means I would rather visit Antarctica.

I still hold out hope that Holland can top their group. I honestly think they have what it takes to make it to the final this year.

Technorati Tags: Sports, Football, Soccer, World Cup, Argentina

Just once in this World Cup I would like to have a perfect game. I want the team I’m supporting to come out to an early 1-0 advantage that becomes 2-0 by halftime. England v. Trinidad and Tobago is not that game.

The problem with England on the field thus far is that they have no leadership on the field. I just don’t think Beckham should be wearing that captain’s armband. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. John Terry should be your captain. That hustle to keep the Soca Warriors off the score sheet absolutely saved England’s ass. Terry has the passion to inspire people. Becks always let his playing do the inspiring, and frankly, that doesn’t work so well when your playing has lost some of its edge.

I see some real problems with the Carragher/Becks linkup. I would give an awful lot to have a healthy Gary Neville if only to have a known partnership between defender and wing on the right side. The Cole/Cole partnership showed some decent promise today on the left side, and I’m hoping some creativity will come from that quarter in the second half.

Peter Crouch should have buried that cross from Beckham. It was a gift from God, and he was duty bound to seal the deal. I love Peter Crouch, and I don’t think he gets nearly the respect he deserves. But, dammit, he seems intent on giving all of his critics just the ammunition they desire.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see Sven bring out Rooney in the second half. I think it’s a dangerous and stupid move, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised.

Just for the record, England are my team, not the USA. There seems to have been some confusion amongst my readers, friends, and acquaintances on this point. I support the USA because I’m an American citizen, but I have far more of my soul invested in the English national team. Remember, I’m far more patriotic about England than I am about America. I’m unapologetic about this.

Technorati Tags: Football, Soccer, England, World Cup

It’s halftime during the Australia/Japan match in the World Cup. The first goal was rather questionable due to a clear foul against Australia’s keeper that led to the goal, but I must say as a neutral observer that Japan is playing some of the prettiest football of the tournament thus far. When they’re playing possession, they look like a free-flowing single-minded organism. The players are right where they should be. The ball is exactly where you’d want it to be. In comparison, Australia looks like a bunch of thugs.

Some other random World Cup thoughts:

• I’m sick of the press criticism of teams that won. Both England and Portugal won 1-0. Yes, they looked unimpressive as the match wore on, but if you intend to be a champion, you have to be able to defend that 1-0 lead for 75+ minutes. You don’t get any extra points for style, and you prime goal in the World Cup is to come away with a victory. Nothing—and I do mean nothing—else matters.
• I wish I had a “selective mute” button. I would love to have just the crowd noise without the American announcers. They routinely make stupid comments, and the overall impression, whether it’s fair or not, is that they have no idea how the game works. For the love of God, stop talking over the game and stop explaining the effing rules in the middle of the game. In fact, just talk about half as much as you’re currently doing, and I might like you better. The Portugal match had European announcers, and it felt so much smoother and less cluttered. The American announcers also can’t shut up about Peter Crouch’s height. Yes, I can see that Crouch is tall. All during the England/Paraguay match, they were either talking about Crouch or David Beckham. For ninety minutes.
• I wonder how much Disney/ABC/ESPN are paying U2. Every commercial has a recent U2 song playing.
• When I left off watching Mexico/Iran, it was 1-1 at halftime. I went out to dinner and had pseudo-Mexican food at Chipotle. I came back to a 3-1 Mexico win. Coincidence? Or something more?
• Yes, I know that England’s only goal against Paraguay was an own goal, but England deserved it. They were pushing hard and creating for the first twenty minutes or so of the game. Becks free kick was brilliant, and it was the spin from the ball that made it just glance off the defender. This wasn’t just a random error, folks. Please stop treating it as such.
• Michael Owen is match fit? I find myself wondering about that. He was invisible during the vast majority of the game and went off well short of ninety minutes.

Technorati Tags: Football, Soccer, England, USA, World Cup, Japan, Australia, Announcers

The World Cup, the world’s biggest sporting event with no peer to speak of, is just around the corner, and those of us who are already soccer/football fans can almost literally feel the buzz in the air. Every four years, the spectacle of the World Cup draws in a few more American fans. If your journey is anything like mine, you’re probably finding it hard to find information about the World Cup and about the sport in general. It’s tough being a football fan in exile here in the States. To that aim and speaking with the voice of someone who has already walked this path, I offer the following advice for following soccer/football here in land of Uncle Sam.

Pick a team to follow. In the upcoming World Cup, support your country. If your country gets eliminated along the way, pick a surrogate team to keep your interest up. I’ve heard a lot of people call soccer boring here in the US, but I assure you that, when a team you care about has their hopes on the line, it brings a well of passion to the surface. After the World Cup, pick a club team to follow and put your hopes behind. It doesn’t matter in the end which club you choose. Pick one in a city you like. Pick one with colors you like. Pick one that showcases your favorite player from the World Cup. Just pick one to focus your attention and energy on. Sports tend to seem boring when you don’t have any context for the magnitude of what’s happening on the field. This is the sole difference between a bunch of men in funny suits and baseball’s World Series.

Pay attention to non-US teams. I don’t intend to slight MLS. It’s the USA’s league, and we need to support it if we want the sport to thrive in this country. Nonetheless, I will say that the quality of play in MLS simply doesn’t compare to the first-division in countries like England, Argentina, and Italy. In addition, you’re dealing with countries that have a football culture that simply can’t be matched here in the US. The environment at the foreign games sometimes seems like a vicious animal just waiting to be unleashed. Immerse yourself in the sports press from your country/league of choice. Following all the personalities involved is actually rather like a soap opera. Or the NBA.

Get Fox Soccer Channel. If you want to watch regular season games from a league other than MLS, you’ll need FSC. Most digital cable packages have it, and you can certainly get it if you have a satellite system. Fox has the exclusive American rights to the English Premier League, which is arguably the finest league in the world. They also play games from France, Germany, Argentina, and Italy. In addition to games, they have some great highlight shows that will give you a great overview of what’s happening in the world of soccer and provide you with a real depth of context for the sport.

Subscribe to Four Four Two. Four Four Two is an English soccer magazine that is quite simply the best in the world. If you speak English, you should be subscribing to it. It will keep you abreast of who the real newsmakers in the sport are while maintaining a humorous style that will actively seek your attention. I actually read this magazine from cover to cover each month, and I feel sad when I’ve reached the end.

Follow RSS feeds from a variety of sources. RSS allows you to use a news aggregator to track web content in much the same way that you manage your email. This more than anything you can do short of moving to England will jumpstart your immersion into the culture surrounding soccer. Here are some great sites to start with:

• ESPN SoccerNet
• MSN Soccer
• BBC Premiership Updates
• BBC League Championship Updates
• Football Commentator
• Guardian Football

Virtually nothing can match the excitement of the FIFA World Cup, but there’s a world of soccer/football happening during the other three years as well. With the right preparation, it’s only a matter of time before you too are bitching about bogus offside rulings and divers like Didier Drogba along with the rest of us.

Striker, the best US soccer magazine, is officially dead in the water. I had a brief moment of hope when I saw a World Cup preview issue in a Cape Coral Publix, but a quick email to Harris Publications has confirmed the worst:

We regret to announce that STRIKER magazine has been discontinued.

If you have sent us a payment for the magazine, and we have not yet processed it, the payment is being returned to you. If you had a subscription to the magazine, we will be sending out refunds for the remaining balance of the subscription. These should arrive shortly.

Please accept our apologies.

-Subscription Dept., Harris Publications

PS: THE SOCCER SPECIAL IS NOT PART OF THE SUBSCRIPTION, IT IS JUST A “SPECIAL” WE’LL SEND YOU A COPY AND DEDUCT THE AMOUNT ($6.50) FROM YOUR REFUND, WHICH YOU WILL RECEIVE SOON.

Striker was like the American version of FourFourTwo. It had some great interviews in its first three issues—David Beckham and TH14 among them—and it’s a real shame that they couldn’t survive until the World Cup, a time when they would have received a natural boon from peripheral interest.

Technorati Tags: Football, Soccer, Striker