Top of the B-List
I clicked on a strange Google Ad today. Nice to see that Campus Crusade for Christ is using the World Cup as an evangelistic opportunity. Jesus And The World Cup is basically an evangelistic tract laid out in the green and gold of Brazil’s team colours. Is this a hint as to whom God favours?
My favourite quote from the page: “If soccer is your source of happiness, then your life can go up and down.”
I’ve been aflutter with excitement for the past several months and now that the FIFA World Cup is almost here, I’ve been immersing myself in research materials in order to win several pools. In the spirit of the current World Cup’s slogan “A Time to Make Friends,” I’m issuing an invitation to join one or all of the following free competitions.
For entertainment purposes only, I assure you.
If you need to brush up on your footie knowledge, I can recommend two great books. The Thinking Fan’s Guide to the World Cup has chapters on each of the 32 qualified countries, and though it won’t really help you pick the winner, it will give you some background on each of the countries and their football cultures. Contributors include Nick Hornby and Dave Eggers. The Match of the Day Guide to the 2006 World Cup is filled with stats and colour photos and even makes some predictions. Expert commentary from Tottenham Hotspur manager Martin Jol should help, too.
For instant gratification, check out the World Cup Blog. And keep your eye on Runner-Up for some interesting tidbits during the tournament.
P.S. If you want to know just how obsessed I’ve become, I’ve even been eyeing the Panini World Cup sticker album. Only 596 stickers to collect!
Tomorrow is Mother’s Day. On Friday at work, someone called in and wanted to have wine delivered to their mother for Mother’s Day. I had to ask someone, “When’s Mother’s Day?”. You see, I haven’t had a mother for almost twenty years now.
It’s very strange. Only one or two of my oldest friends ever met her. My lovely wife and her family never knew her, although they would have loved her. And I know that my mother would have loved Brooke, and if it’s possible for her to see me now, I know she’s happy for us.
But it is a strange empty hole in the calendar. I’m not so sad anymore, and it’s not like I want people to feel sorry for me. It’s just that when this day rolls around every year, I don’t know what to do. I have a wonderful mother-in-law, but that’s not the same.
For Mother’s Day this year, then, let me tell you a story about my mum.
During my teens, my mum and I were very close. I’m an only child, and after the age of 13 or so, my dad wasn’t around much, so we sort of depended on each other. One of our rituals was to go to the movies together on a regular basis. And so, in 1981, my 16-year old self went off to see Raiders of the Lost Ark with his mum. You have to realize that I wasn’t in the least bit embarrassed by this. We were buddies, and she was cool. Well, if you remember the movie at all, there’s a scene where Indiana Jones is fighting a huge guy in the shadow of a moving airplane, and just when the guy’s about to finish him off, the spinning propeller of the airplane makes contact with the back of the big brute’s head.
It was at that moment that my mum jumped in fear and her flailing arms caught me right in the crotch.
I miss you, Mum!
In a Soldier’s Footsteps (Denmark, 2005, Director: Mette Zeruneith, 89 minutes): Truth really is stranger than fiction. When we first meet Steven Ndugga in 1999, he’s a personable and articulate refugee living in Denmark who approaches the filmmakers wanting to have his story told. A former child soldier, he escaped Uganda with his life, but lost his wife and son. Years later, during the filming of this documentary, he receives information that his son is still alive, and is in fact now a child soldier himself. After Steven returns to Uganda to find his son, he disappears. Over the next five years, he reappears and then disappears again, and the story just keeps getting stranger. Like a Graham Greene novel, the film finds the truth elusive, but it makes a fascinating tale.
Article about the film on the Danish Film Institute web site
(9/10)
Once in a Lifetime: The Extraordinary Story of the New York Cosmos (USA/UK, 2006, Director: Paul Crowder and John Downer, 97 minutes): The North American Soccer League was struggling along through the 1970s until the New York Cosmos, owned by Warner Communications head Steve Ross, decided to bring superstar Pele to the Big Apple. Suddenly, attendance was up, and the Cosmos started winning. Continuing the formula by bringing some European stars over, the Cosmos won several league titles over the next few years. In the process, the once-moribund NASL expanded quickly to 24 teams. Unfortunately, the resulting dilution of talent, and the inability of smaller-market clubs to pay the huge salaries demanded by European or Latin American stars, meant that the league soon imploded.
The film tells the story with humour and verve, and it’s hard not to be a little bit nostalgic for the days when 70,000 people would crowd into Giants stadium to watch “the other football.” But ultimately, the Cosmos’ strategy was short-sighted. Building an audience for soccer in North America was going to take time, and the free-spending style of Ross and the Cosmos attracted only fairweather fans, who would melt away as soon as the team stopped winning. Other franchises couldn’t attract enough fans in the first place, and the league suffered as a result.
It was interesting that the director admitted afterwards that he is a huge fan of Chelsea Football Club in the English Premiership. Chelsea are following a similar strategy at the moment, with the seemingly endless billions of owner Roman Abramovich funding the construction of another superteam. So far, they’ve won back to back titles in England, but to the detriment of the league, according to many observers. Without a salary cap, the English Premier League drains talent away from the rest of the world, and Chelsea are the richest club of all. This concentration of talent makes the game less competitive in the long term, and while it may attract a few new fans, they’re not the sort of fans who will stick around if and when the team starts losing.
Many of the American innovations brought to the game by the NASL have made it into the game in the rest of the world. For example, penalty shootouts to decide games tied after regulation time. This will always be unpopular with football purists, but for the casual fan, it certainly adds excitement to the game. Other gimmicks weren’t so successful, thankfully. Who wants to see cheerleaders at a football match?
The only flaw in the film was the absence of any present-day interviews with Pele or Johan Cruyff (who played for the Los Angeles Aztecs and Washington Diplomats franchises), though I believe numerous attempts were made to obtain their participation. The director Paul Crowder promised lots of fun stuff in the DVD extras, including their attempts to get Pele on board.
An interesting article on the editing of the film
Official site of the New York Cosmos
Wikipedia entry on the New York Cosmos
Information on the NASL from the National Soccer Hall of Fame
The American Soccer History Archives
The NASL Alumni Association arranged a reunion for more than 60 former players in September 2005.
(9/10)