One of these things is not like the other…
Yeah, it’s funny how the relative handful of soccer fanatics in the U.S. insist that the swaths of Americans who are apathetic towards soccer are just somehow not getting it. When you have to beat your head against the wall trying to convince people of the entertainment value of a sport, then that puts you in the same boat as the XFL and the WNBA.
The truth is that there’s nothing to “get” about soccer. It’s a simple, straightforward sport. I’d argue that its beauty lies in its simplicity. With any kids’ game, most sports, even in a stripped-down form suitable for a pickup game, still have to observe certain forms. With soccer it’s 2 basic rules: kick the ball in the goal, and don’t touch the ball with your hands. Simple. Anyone can pick it up and start running around having fun. That’s why soccer is such a popular youth sport in the U.S. and around the world: it’s simple and fun.
But that doesn’t mean it’s fun to watch on television. Americans want 2 things in their team sports: exciting action, and strategy. We love to play Monday morning quarterback. Where’s the strategy in soccer? You move a guy up a little? You sub in a particular player? Big deal (I’m sure this yet another example of pigheaded Amerikkkan ignorance about the glorious game of soccer, right guys?). I don’t think anyone has tried to argue that it isn’t athletic or that the competition isn’t fierce, we just don’t find it that interesting as a spectator sport (the prettyboy competitors and flopping just add to the distaste). Trying to disparage detractors with irrelevant comments about worshiping scoring or being rednecks is a copout.
Oh, and here’s a tip: the reason we claim that soccer could be improved with a few key rule changes isn’t because we care, it’s because we’re hoping it will make you shut up about soccer and leave us alone.
I will add that I do admire the English Premier League’s system of relegation. I think the American pro sports leagues could stand to implement a similar system.
Yes, it is. Although thanks for the ad hominem attack. It’s fine that you don’t get the strategy. When I watch baseball I see some guys trying to hit a ball with a stick. Where’s the strategy in that? You don’t see strategy because you don’t get it. That’s fine, I don’t care, but don’t talk like you know the sport when you clearly dont.
Here’s a tip, that’s probably the worst way to get soccer fans to stop talking to you about soccer.
There is little to no strategy in soccer. Let’s stop pretending it’s this secretly complex game.
Which is why all coaches have exactly the same amount of success with a given set of players.
I wanted to vote for “I don’t like it because of my sweet style.” And it lasts a billion hours, apparently.
Who says it’s because of strategy? Maybe they hate their coach. Maybe he lets them go out partying the night before games and they play like crap. Maybe he’s a master motivator. Who knows. It sure as hell isn’t because of play calling.
Thanks for mentioning that. In other “Why don’t Americans like soccer?” discussions I’ve seen crop up on the Internet, the usual responses are along the lines of “Americans demand high scoring”, “Americans want lots of violence in their sports”, “Americans are too culturally immature and lacking in intelligence to appreciate the beauty and choreography of the sport”, and so on.
One thing I almost never hear, though. Why don’t Canadians like soccer? The couple of times I’ve seen it come up, the response is usually “they like hockey too much, and soccer has no place in their national consciousness” or something like that. Well, why isn’t the same consideration given for (American) football and baseball in the US?
In the United States, there’s four big professional sports: football, baseball, basketball and hockey. Maybe five, if you consider NASCAR. (“Oh, those unsophisticated and dim-witted Americans can’t appreciate Grand Prix racing!”) Where does soccer fit in? In Europe, there’s going to be soccer and maybe Grand Prix racing. In some countries, there’s basketball and hockey, but it doesn’t seem to have the same high stature as in the US and Canada. In the UK, there’s also rugby and cricket. In Ireland, there’s also hurling and Gaelic football. European countries don’t seem to have the variety of high-profile professional sports that is seen in North America, so soccer seems to take on a role that would be almost the equivalent of football plus baseball here.
Maybe we should chastise the Europeans for not appreciating the beauty of baseball, a sport that can be used to create an analogy for just about every situation, a sport steeped in tradition and an unbroken record of statistics almost from the time of the sport’s foundation.
How often is the 4-2-4 played nowadays? How many teams play with a libero? Pretty weird to make drastic changes through time if there’s no strategy.
Dude- please stop talking. You’re making yourself look like a moron.
Germany played with a sweeper at Euro '96 (and won the tournament). Can’t think of anyone since then, though.
I had to look up libero, for the record.
You really don’t know what you’re talking about.
So many don’t like soccer. That’s fine. Net every sport will appeal to everyone. But please stop trying to justify it. You tend to sound really stupid when you do.
We get that a bit in Australia too, it can get your back up a bit, when you’d otherwise not really care about the issue.
Another little bone of contention, also unrelated to the merits of game itself, is the recent push to call it football. After decades of them themselves calling it soccer,along with most othersm, it can be a little inflammatory (especially to the Mexicans :P)
Where is this “recent push” happening?
Soccer had been called “football” (or futbol) in much of the soccer-playing world for a long time, and if you say “football” without any qualifying statement to a Brit, they will almost certainly assume that you’re talking about soccer.
If you mean that it’s happening in Australia, well then i think the soccer folks are going to be out of luck. I don’t think Aussies will ever refer to soccer as football, not while Aussie Rules and the rugby codes are still around.
- An assertion that soccer doesn’t have any “strategy” simply because it doesn’t have the set plays you find in American football shows an appalling lack of understanding of two things: the meaning of the word “strategy” (hint: it has nothing to do with individual plays, which would fall under the meaning of “tactics”) and the reality of strategy in soccer. Indeed, a team’s overall strategy in soccer is in some ways more important than in American football, precisely because the play is free flowing, without many “set” plays (btw, there are plenty of set plays, they just usually get limited to static positions like corner kicks and free kicks from the danger zone). And a manager in soccer (the equivalent of a head coach in American football) is certainly quite important to what goes on on the field, even if he doesn’t have some silly script of plays in his hand and has to hold that up in front of his mouth to keep the cameras from seeing what he is telling his players to do.
Frankly, one of the endearing aspects to soccer is that the manager/coach is NOT calling the plays. This means that it is the efforts of the players that determine the outcome. I’ve mentioned this before in soccer threads here. It means that my job as coach of the soccer team is to work with them during practice to hone their skills, to educate them as to strategy and tactics, to instill them with spirit and confidence, etc. Then when the game comes, I’m there to set the overall strategy (do we go route 1, do we swing wide and then cross in, do we play a possession holding game, do we try to attack via one, two or three front men, etc.) as well as to remind the players during the game of how to modify their tactics to meet the tactics and overall strategy of the opponents. Then, the players get to create on the field their artwork, combining their overlaps and wall passes and triangles and crosses and give and gos and so forth to make the final masterpiece.
Now, of course, part of the problem for many Americans is that they don’t understand all this when they watch a game. If they never played the sport, all of what goes on on the field tends to appear pretty formless and chaotic, which is why they make really stupid sounding statements about lack of strategy, etc. I know for a fact that the same sort of cluelessness can exist about sports like baseball (why did he pretend to run like that? how come he threw the ball to second base when the runner was going home? why does the catcher keep holding down his fingers like that?). And even if they do play the sport as youth, their understanding of the strategy and tactics is usually nil, partly because their coaches don’t understand it, and simply have them do a series of drills they copy from basketball, or have seen other clueless coaches doing, and partly because no one who is 10 is paying attention to the strategy of why his team has him and one other player up top, and four of his friends are playing in the midfield, etc. You would be surprised how many coaches even in this day and age of relative enlightenment about soccer here will call their fullbacks “defenders”, as if the midfield doesn’t defend when they don’t have the ball, or their backs have no offensive responsibilities! I heard one coach last year in varsity high school soccer here in South Carolina tell his backs not to cross the mid-field stripe when they had the ball, regardless of where we had our forwards positioned while defending. :rolleyes: It is no wonder in such a benighted atmosphere that the vast majority of Americans watch a soccer game and see nothing but a ball careening around the field without much purpose or strategy, only to occasionally manage to find its way into a net, whereupon the goal is disallowed for some reason they cannot comprehend, but which gives the ball to the other team to kick mindlessly downfield. :eek: To this I can only say: education is the key to understanding, and enjoyment. 
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“Football” in any nation will have a meaning equivalent to what the dominant form of that sport is in that nation. Football in Australia is not football in England is not football in America. They don’t even really USE the word football in Italy, where the word for the sport is calcio, a term which goes back quite a ways to describe a sport that bears resemblance to the precursor of football in England (get your town of guys together and kick a pig’s bladder inflated with air into the town square of the opposition guys). I only use “football” to describe soccer in America with tongue planted firmly in cheek, though when typing for a larger audience (involving people from around the world) I usually talk about American (or gridiron) football, as opposed to soccer or “football”. And yes, in England, “football” without a qualifier is usually used to talk about Association football, abbreviated “Assoc. Football” way back when, thus giving rise to the term “soccer”.
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Hi, Opal!
Trying to read all that was like trying to watch a soccer game.
Exactly.
Interesting, and more complex than most Americans are willing to deal with.
Oh man, you really turned the tables, didn’t you?!
I wouldn’t expect a Cleveland fan to understand anything without cartoons and a beer commercial involved.