The Hate Soccer Thread

[quote]Dr. Stig wrote:
superscience wrote:
American’s think Football is for Pussy’s ? Think again…hardest sport in the world.

soccer if far from the hardest sport in the world, its easy to play and easy to become good at. its not at a very high standard either the average vo2 max of a pro soccer player is 50 which is shit.

It was a joke…how many mainstream sports have a good chance of serious violence breaking out at any given match ? Last football match I went to…Liverpool vs Norwich many years ago, somebody threw a knife at the goalie and tried to set the terraces on fire.

Then there was a running street battle between ‘fans’ and a dad with his kid got stabbed.[/quote]

Last year after a major soccer game between 2 south american countries that i cant recall but i believe it was Chile and ?. some illegal aliens from south america were in a local bar arguing over the game.as 3 of them left the bar and were walking down the sidewalk the other one got in his car and went up on the side walk and ran over them killing a couple of them.those were the first soccer related fatalities in our city.

Not a huge fan of Soccer but I admire the athletisism involved and guys like this that spend years to develop these skills I highly respect.

I was actually pretty closed minded when I started watching some World Cup games this weekend, but I pleasantly surprised at how entertaining the games were.

Just the idea of having an international tournament every 4 years sounds awesome to me. It actually makes me wish I liked Soccer.


Now a lot of you are bashing Football, saying it doesn’t take any aerobic fitness compared to soccer; that you just stand around for 60 seconds after every play; blah, blah, blah.

1.) Those soccer players aren’t exactly running wind sprints for 90 minutes. There’s an awful lot of half-assed jogging in those games.

2.) It’s not like football players are putting their feet up and sipping gatorade between plays. If you haven’t played before, I think you’d be surprised how much you’re hustling between plays.

3.) In a football, if the ball is live, chances are you’re going 100%. Basketball, baseball, and soccer all have lots and lots of time in which the players are just standing around while the ball is live; this doesn’t happen much in football. Pair this with Point #2 above, and I think you all might be surprised at just how much aerobic endurance football takes.

4.) Average play in football takes about 5 seconds. Average time between plays is about 40 seconds. There are about 75 plays (150 if you play both ways) from scrimmage in your average football game. Your Average regular season football game takes about 3 hours to play. Do the math.

Bottom line, if you don’t think Football takes lots of aerobic fitness, try running 75 20 yard sprints (100% all-out sprints; dogging it in football will get you injured) over the course of 3 hours.

[quote]alstan90 wrote:
If soccer is so bad why is it the most popular sport on the planet? And why does no-one else in the world except, say japan and canada, play your sports of baseball and american football?[/quote]

The reason that soccer is the most popular world is because it requires absolutely zero equipment. Find yourself a ball, and you have a soccer game.

I personally don’t understand what the appeal of soccer is, but it’s a cultural thing. Here in North America, soccer is not a major part of our culture. Here in Canada, hockey is everything. Period. You guys will never understand it and I don’t expect you to – just don’t insult it when you don’t understand it. That’s why I will refrain from insulting soccer – I don’t understand it.

[quote]AgentOrange wrote:
alstan90 wrote:
If soccer is so bad why is it the most popular sport on the planet? And why does no-one else in the world except, say japan and canada, play your sports of baseball and american football?

The reason that soccer is the most popular world is because it requires absolutely zero equipment. Find yourself a ball, and you have a soccer game.

I personally don’t understand what the appeal of soccer is, but it’s a cultural thing. Here in North America, soccer is not a major part of our culture. Here in Canada, hockey is everything. Period. You guys will never understand it and I don’t expect you to – just don’t insult it when you don’t understand it. That’s why I will refrain from insulting soccer – I don’t understand it.[/quote]

If hockey was “everything” in Canada Winnipeg and Quebec City would still have hocket teams (yeah they were both relatively small markets, but it wasn’t like they were coming close to selling-out every night either).

As for soccer/football… sometimes it IS boring to watch… particularly if there are very defensive teams playing; but that’s true of any sport.

The beauty of world cup soccer is that you see the very best players from all over the world. So just about everyone is represented (parties all over the world) and the levels of play and skill are generally outstanding. Also it’s one of the rare sports where it doesn’t matter how big and rich your country is… that doesn’t mean diddly when you step onto the pitch.

[quote]tGunslinger wrote:

…Bottom line, if you don’t think Football takes lots of aerobic fitness, try running 75 20 yard sprints (100% all-out sprints; dogging it in football will get you injured) over the course of 3 hours.[/quote]

sprinting is an anaerobic function.

[quote]Kuz wrote:

I think most guys who dump on soccer should go to a live match. I went to the U.S. vs. Latvia a few weeks ago which was the final friendly for the U.S. prior to the World Cup. Without a doubt, the best looking women I have ever seen at a sporting event. Bar none. Never seen the equivalent at any baseball, basketball, hockey or football game I’ve ever been to (and I’ve been to hundreds).[/quote]

That’s what titty bars are for, not sports.

(Although the best looking women I’ve ever seen were at an Oscar De La Hoya fight. Good lord)
[/quote]
And most guys who make the overly-macho claims of “tough guys” like HH or doogie are probably the same guys who tried playing soccer once and were utterly embarassed by someone else, hence it must be a sissy/metro sport. Of course, they might also be the same guys who talk about how tough football is, but never play either…[/quote]

I could lay out my football experience/knowledge for you if you want to read it. I’m 99% sure it would dwarf yours.

My soccer experience all took place before the age of 12, as it should be. Then it was time to play a man’s game.

[quote]Boles wrote:
VorteX, you know that Ronaldinho commercial is fake.[/quote]

i knew a guy in high school who could do it twice in a row just like that, consistently. so you never know.

To each his/her own. Soccer players have tremendous strength/endurance and great coordination Its a tough game I sure as heck can’t play.

[quote]Headhunter wrote:
If 90 minutes of watching people run up and down a field chasing a little white ball just bores the living hell out of you, then post here.

I can tolerate baseball, though often fall asleep on the rare occasion that I watch a game. Hockey is fine, mostly because of the fights, and its over in 60 minutes.

I know I’ll get flamed by the soccer crowd on here. Go ahead…it’ll certainly be more lively than soccer, ice dancing, and curling, and all such other ‘sports’.

HH[/quote]

Yeah i agree… if the us womens team is better than the mens then its not a sport.

The rest of the world is populated by pansy tards. Football is the reason we dominate the world. You can easily see the cause/effect relationship if you compare football’s popularity with our influence in the world.

Football teaches our boys to be men. It prepares them for the more important battles they will face someday. You’ll never see a damn pee-wee football league not keeping score so everyone feels like a winner. Football is step one in having the strongest military in the history of the world.

No other sport requires such an extensive amount of planning. No other sport is unable to be dominated by individual athletes. Football DEMANDS teamwork to win.

A few readings from the Book of Lombardi, all praise to him–[quote]

A game that requires the constant conjuring of animosity.

A man can be as great as he wants to be. If you believe in yourself and have the courage, the determination, the dedication, the competitive drive and if you are willing to sacrifice the little things in life and pay the price for the things that are worthwhile, it can be done.

A school without football is in danger of deteriorating into a medieval study hall.

Confidence is contagious. So is lack of confidence.

Dictionary is the only place that success comes before work. Hard work is the price we must pay for success. I think you can accomplish anything if you’re willing to pay the price.

I firmly believe that any man’s finest hour, the greatest fulfillment of all that he holds dear, is that moment when he has worked his heart out in a good cause and lies exhausted on the field of battle - victorious.

If it doesn’t matter who wins or loses, then why do they keep score?
Vince Lombardi

If winning isn’t everything, why do they keep score?

If you can accept losing you can’t win. If you can walk you can run. No one is ever hurt. Hurt is in your mind.

Individual commitment to a group effort - that is what makes a team work, a company work, a society work, a civilization work.

It is time for us all to stand and cheer for the doer, the achiever - the one who recognizes the challenges and does something about it.

Leaders aren’t born they are made. And they are made just like anything else, through hard work. And that’s the price we’ll have to pay to achieve that goal, or any goal.

Life’s battles don’t always go to the stronger or faster man. But sooner or later the man who wins, is the man who thinks he can.

Mental toughness is many things. It is humility because it behooves all of us to remember that simplicity is the sign of greatness and meekness is the sign of true strength. Mental toughness is spartanism with qualities of sacrifice, self-denial, dedication. It is fearlessness, and it is love.

Once you agree upon the price you and your family must pay for success, it enables you to ignore the minor hurts, the opponent’s pressure, and the temporary failures.

Once you learn to quit, it becomes a habit.

People who work together will win, whether it be against complex football defenses, or the problems of modern society.

Practice does not make perfect. Only perfect practice makes perfect.

Show me a good loser, and I’ll show you a loser.

Teamwork is what the Green Bay Packers were all about. They didn’t do it for individual glory. They did it because they loved one another.

The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather a lack of will.

The greatest accomplishment is not in never falling, but in rising again after you fall.

The harder you work, the harder it is to surrender.

The leader can never close the gap between himself and the group. If he does, he is no longer what he must be. He must walk a tightrope between the consent he must win and the control he must exert.

The price of success is hard work, dedication to the job at hand, and the determination that whether we win or lose, we have applied the best of ourselves to the task at hand.

The quality of a person’s life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor.

There is no room for second place. There is only one place in my game and that is first place. I have finished second twice in my time at Green Bay and I never want to finish second again.

We would accomplish many more things if we did not think of them as impossible.

Winners never quit and quitters never win.

Winning is not a sometime thing; it’s an all time thing. You don’t win once in a while, you don’t do things right once in a while, you do them right all the time. Winning is habit. Unfortunately, so is losing.

Football is like life, it requires perseverance, self-denial, hard work sacrifice, dedication and respect for authority.

Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing.
[/quote]

Bud Wilkinson:
If a team is to reach its potential, each player must be willing to subordinate his personal goals to the good of the team.

Dan Birdwell:
You have to play this game like somebody just hit your mother with a two-by-four

Knute Rockne:
Football is a game played with arms, legs and shoulders but mostly from the neck up.

Dick Butkus:
When I played pro football, I never set out to hurt anyone deliberately - unless it was, you know, important, like a league game or something

John Steinbeck:
Sectional football games have the glory and the despair of war, and when a Texas team takes the field against a foreign state, it is an army with banners.

Ted Solotaroff:
A professional football team warms up grimly and disparately, like an army on maneuvers: the ground troops here, the tanks there, the artillery and air force over there.

Football is, after all, a wonderful way to get rid of your aggressions without going to jail for it. ~Heywood Hale Brown

Pro football is like nuclear warfare. There are no winners, only survivors. ~Frank Gifford

At the base of it was the urge, if you wanted to play football, to knock someone down, that was what the sport was all about, the will to win closely linked with contact. ~George Plimpton

Football is not a contact sport. It’s a collision sport. Dancing is a… contact sport. ~Duffy Daugherty

There are several differences between a football game and a revolution. For one thing, a football game usually lasts longer and the participants wear uniforms. Also, there are usually more casualties in a football game. The object of the game is to move a ball past the other team’s goal line. This counts as six points. No points are given for lacerations, contusions, or abrasions, but then no points are deducted, either. Kicking is very important in football. In fact, some of the more enthusiastic players even kick the ball, occasionally. ~Alfred Hitchcock

BRANDON HEFFERNAN:
Football is a game in which the team concept is paramount, and individual players are mere cogs in a machine programmed specifically for its current opponent. It’s a game of brute force and strategic finesse, one-on-one battles and overarching tactical concepts. In a country whose oldest motto is “don’t tread on me,” football is the most popular sport not because it’s a metaphor for war and land acquisition, but because it’s the metaphor for war and land acquisition. And no, this doesn’t mean you have to be into war to be into football. It was Alan Ginsberg, of all people, who said that he watches “for the display of the human form divine.” There’s something for everyone in this great game.

Those who dislike or are indifferent to football tend to incorrectly assume it’s a game of brawn, a game of muscled thugs imparting structured violence on other muscled thugs. Fans of the game know better. We know it’s a game of brains, and it uses strength, speed, and the element of surprise to carry out its commands.

Some random blog:
Football is, rather explicitly, a reduction of first- and second- generation war tactics, with all the quasi-nationalist trappings, both with the teams and with the overt nationalism before each and every game. Formations, set plays and techniques and positions – that’s first- and second-generation warfare there. The fans, the colors, the symbols, all of it – it’s war without the blood. That’s fine; our lizard brains still need that from time to time.

[quote]swivel wrote:
sprinting is an anaerobic function.
[/quote]

One sprint is.

Running a whole bunch of them over a long period of time will definately challenge your aerobic capacities.

I like soccer/football even though I don’t understand all the finer points of it… but boring? You’re kidding right? Have you seen the agility and stamina it takes to play that game?!? If I could move half that fast I would be happy!

Oh yeah, “Boredom is the sign of a weak mind”

~V

[quote]supermick wrote:

In the mean time, i see no reason to soccer bash. Its one of the major team sports in the world and your competing in the second most widely watched sporting event on the TV, Supporrt your team and stop playing the fucking hard man ‘theres no contact, its not our sport’ then you may learn a thing or two.[/quote]

Great point. But actually, the World Cup is the biggest sporting event (Live and TV ) in the world - even bigger than the Olympics.

[quote]
Regarding hoologanism - too many issues to delve into but its not what you think. Many guys have the middle class income, respectable jobs etc. The culture surrounding it would be difficult to explain on an internet forum.[/quote]

But you should see the coverage here in the USA - it’s all “hooligan this” and “racist that” - it’s basically giving you the impression that all fans in Europe are like this - which I find utter bullshit - as if they don’t find the game or its players interesting enough so they have to scandalize the event with bullshit like that.

In reading a lot of the posts - I find it funny how the non-American reaction to American football- even right down to the criticisms - pretty much mirror American criticisms of regular football.

The same way you non-Americans don’t “understand” American football - is pretty much the same way most Americans don’t “understand” football. I don’t understand so many over there demand such understanding when the same is usually not given to the form of football played over here.

Just an observation I’ve noticed.

[quote]Kuz wrote:
Headhunter wrote:
See… this was more entertaining than soccer.

HH

That’s because you’re a troll.[/quote]

… now back to your soy latte…

Doogie,

Great quotes!

HH

[quote]tGunslinger wrote:
swivel wrote:
sprinting is an anaerobic function.

One sprint is.

Running a whole bunch of them over a long period of time will definately challenge your aerobic capacities.
[/quote]

i’m not saying it won’t make you tired, but it’s only gonna increase your serobic capacity about as much as lifting will, which isn’t very much. and then only if you’re out of shape to begin with. walking for 4 hours will increase aerobic efficiency 100% better than 75 all out 2o yard sprints over the same time.

The whole soccer vs football argument is just silly. I have played both, I like to watch both, and have an appreciation for both. Do you really consider these sports to be mutually exclusive?

Sports become fun to watch when you have an understanding of and an appreciation for the game. I love to watch both, I get excited when college and the NFL seasons start, and I get excited when the world cup starts.

“Mass genocide’s the most exhausting activity one can engage in, next to soccer.”–Loki, ‘Dogma’

[quote]Headhunter wrote:
If 90 minutes of watching people run up and down a field chasing a little white ball just bores the living hell out of you, then post here.

I can tolerate baseball, though often fall asleep on the rare occasion that I watch a game. Hockey is fine, mostly because of the fights, and its over in 60 minutes.

I know I’ll get flamed by the soccer crowd on here. Go ahead…it’ll certainly be more lively than soccer, ice dancing, and curling, and all such other ‘sports’.

HH[/quote]

Are you serious? Just because it isn’t popular in America, don’t dismiss it as a sport. Let me guess, you, just like every other American sports journalist, thumb your nose at soccer, but have no problem calling Golf a sport.

Cricket is also huge in several countries. Is this not considered a sport because it isn’t popular in America?

That is just a little arrogant on your part. Just because you don’t understand it doesn’t mean it isn’t a true sport.