Newcastle United is number one in the Premiership.*
This is cause for much celebration and bragging - not least of all that is coincides with me being number one in my fantasy football league (fantasy soccer to those of you not interested). In second place in that fantasy league - my wife. Truly, this is a wonderous age in which we live.
*Until Tuesday at the very least.
For some reason the title feature isn't working today. So make up your own. It's interactive!
Every morning I’m laying in bed listening to the CBC trying to wake me up. It’s usually at that time of the day I come up with an idea of what I should write a blog post about. Today was a real doozy. I had a hard time deciding between why certain media and elected officials have a hard-on for Canada to be a victim of terrorism and the people in lawn chairs at Bluesfest.
So I went with why we’re crap at soccer again.
Yes, I watched the game last night. Okay, not all of it because I was reading some Green Lantern comics for my other blog and I knew they’d lose. But I did watch some of the start, and when my wife flicked back to it about five minutes later Canada was already losing, and I watched the last forty minutes. Here’s the thing. For the most part we have a decent team. It’s the strikers that are absolute garbage.
There were all these images of this Lombardo kid upset when, really, he should be upset. If this was Columbia he’d best sleep with one eye open if anyone remembers the 1994 World Cup. It’s like he was on LSD and was hallucinating that the ball was a flaming vampire bat trying to eat him so he’d kick it as far away from his as humanly possible (mostly at a ninety degree angle to the earth). There’s no other way I can explain how horrible that guy was other than he was trying to start the Canadian Space Agency by kicking balls really high in the sky.
There were empty net headers that I could have made. While wearing my glasses. But our strikers managed to put the ball really high up over the net.
While they weren’t putting the ball really high over the net, they were just sort of watching the defenders kick it away when they could have easily run up to it and either taken a shot on goal or at least avoided Congo clearing it yet again. I know they must have been feeling utterly defeated but come the fuck on you bunch of babies. Suck it up.
There was generally solid defending. There was good long ball play and a bevy of crosses to make anyone proud but when you have strikers that are utter crap and have given up – no wonder the only record we set is shameful. First host nation to not score a goal.
Ironically, after the keeper got sent off for what I can only assume was the fact he decided to get drunk while the rest of his team lost which caused him to play the ball well out of his area – there was his Adidas commercial about his dedication to the sport. Unintentional hilarity.
I feel bad for guys like David Edgars who didn’t give up and played solidly. But I’m a biased Newcastle fan. Still, he deserved better than to watch the rest of his team waste the opportunities he gave them
Or, How Many Goals Canada Has Scored in Soccer During Our Illustrious International Crusade
Okay, I realize we’ve probably managed to score more than 20 goals by now but I can be forgiven for making the assumption we’re a crap side on the pitch after watching that debut game against Chile. Heck, if a blind man was miraculously granted sight for ninety minutes and watched that game, seeing soccer for the first time ever, even he would have been able to tell the difference between a dominant team that was comfortable on the ball and a team that just didn’t belong there. Maybe that’s a bit harsh on Canada but they were absolute crap in that game. I do hope they turn it around because I’d like to see them do well, I’m just not holding my breath.
When you look at our FIFA ranking, you’ll understand my sense of futility here. We’re in the same group as all the other nations that have had massive genocides, famines, and other horrible disasters (natural or man-made) as well as some of the worst possible living conditions found on the planet. The only other “Western” nation of similar rank is New Zealand but I think they’re low ranking is because of all the trolls and orks raiding any human gathering. Well at least that’s my impression of New Zealand after watching The Lord of the Rings movies a few times.
So why are we crap? It’s the talk of my household and immediate vicinity. I keep hearing that it’s because we only have about 2 months where humans can kick a ball around outside during the year. While that makes a bit of logical sense, I don’t think that’s really it. That is a part of the equation, granted, another part is money – in that we don’t give any to sports (well I guess we give it to parents who enroll their kids into sports until the next election). Nope, the answer is that we’re a hockey nation (as long as Pat Quinn isn’t coaching).
Sure we don’t actually get medals at the Olympics anymore, but our junior teams are consistent performers. Pretty much any guy on the street can rattle off their favourite players, plays and all time favourite goals and how to improve their team (trade Redden). There’s nothing wrong in this, our team is more or less where it should be.
But seriously, don’t ever rag on our players for NOT playing for the Canadian team when they are eligible for teams like England and the Dutch. It’s like getting mad at a hockey player for abandoning his Junior B team for a gig in the NHL. We’re crap, let’s not hold back our talent. I mean didn’t we cut Owen Hargreaves? And now we’re all pissy that he won’t play for us. Gimme a break, he’s where he deserves to be.
I am happy to see the MLS taking off and supporting more local talent. Eventually we’ll be better contenders and hopefully get out of the FIFA group that contains countries that don’t have enough electricity to show up on a nightime map of the Earth. It might even happen in my lifetime.
