Some hysterical quotes:
Basically, the ball is being criticized for being too light and too curvy, as if it were a fashion model who eats too little food and has too much plastic surgery.and
The ball was designed to be groovier than a Beach Boys album, made of molded polyurethane panels with a grippy feel, and engineered to provide the shooter maximum control. It has been tested in wind tunnels. Robots whacked at the ball to simulate free kicks and corner kicks. The party-hearty wives and girlfriends of England’s players took it out and got it drunk.as well as great soccer trivia with vivid imagery:
In less affluent parts of the world, some youngsters grow up playing soccer with balls made of old shirts or plastic bags. Sissi, a star with Brazil in the 1999 Women’s World Cup, used to kick around the heads of her dolls.and some sobering sports stats:
Goal scoring has gone down, not up, over the decades at the World Cup, peaking at 5.4 goals per game in 1954 and dropping to 2.3 in 2006.
Keep those eyes pealed to the tube, or you might miss the goal!
Drat the system at work that won't let me comment!
ReplyDeleteI think the offside rule, as much or more than anything, has accounted for the death of the goal. Not because people would indulge in goofy tactics, but because now any long downfield pass is questioned, any player breaking through at speed as the ball flies above him is doubted. Defenders try to play a high line, squeezing the play into the center of the field. Kill the offside rule and you would have more goals and fewer arguments about who was where for a split second when something else was happening very far away on the pitch.
Of course, some would point out that the difference between the ball being in the net and not is a matter of a split second and a few inches too. :-)
Also to add...one of the reasons I don't get thoroughly fed up with the old buzzards that run FIFA, about the only thing that keeps me from seeing them wholly and only as greedy, self-aggrandising old worts with their trotters and snouts in the trough is their willingness to push back against the insane demands of hyperactive modern culture and preserve the essence of the game. They reject fancy electronics in the ball, they slam instant replay for the conjuring trick and match-killer that it is. Up there on the pinnacle, where they could be bribed by Adidas and Nike and Puma with Learjets covered in gold, they reject (so far) all the nonsense that would forever create a divide between those venues with expensive, high-tech, soul-destroying tchotkes and all the other 99.9% of the unseen fields around the world where football's true devotees practice their art. The day that those boys and girls in Brazilian favelas, or the backstreets of Accra, or dusty, pitted school pitches in Damascus can't play essentially the same game that's played in Maracana, in Wembley, in Nou Camp--22 players, some referees, a ball, and goals--that's the day that the Game will cease to be the World's Game and become just another instance of bread and circuses. Just let football be football, I say.
ReplyDeleteOffsides analysis - makes sense (even to me, novice). And totally agree that keeping the game free of tech is a good thing. Nice images of Rio's favelas, Accra's backstreets, and the dusty, pitted school pitches in Damascus :) Wish I said that!
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