Soccer: Still the World’s Greatest Sport

It can be a daunting task to find people who respect the sport of soccer in the United States, despite its status as the most loved sport in the world. Americans turn to other pastimes, most prominently baseball, basketball, football, and hockey. While I love all of these sports, a year of watching “the people’s game” was enough to convert me into a true soccer enthusiast. Soccer is regarded as so much more than a sport in the international community. It’s a lifestyle. Americans view soccer as dull and slow paced. But outside the United States soccer matches can draw crowds of over 100,000 for an individual club match, and demands the attention of almost 6 billion people worldwide during the World Cup. Many Americans are instantly turned off when they hear of low scoring games; the possibility of a goalless tie, 0-0, is unappealing to fans of higher scoring sports like football. However, one who delves past the surface is exposed to the most carefully and cleverly crafted sport ever. While the popularity of Major League Soccer largely stagnant in the U.S., Americans need to drop their preconceived notions about soccer, approach the sport with an open mind, and allow themselves to be enthralled by the beautiful game of soccer.

Before last year, when I started watching for the first time, I shared many of the same views concerning soccer as most Americans. It appeared to be a dull, low scoring game with outdated rules and crazed, riotous fans that took the sport far too seriously. Instead I favored the constant intensity and competitive nature of football, the flash and finesse of basketball, the grittiness and determination of hockey, and the strategy and suspense of baseball. These sports provided me with a steady diet of excitement, and whenever one of my favorite teams wasn’t performing well, I knew I had the next season’s sport to look forward to. While I am still a huge fan of American sports teams, as the years went by I began to see just how narrow Americans sports are.

American soldiers play soccer in Iraq

If the teams I liked weren’t winning the NBA Championship, the Super Bowl, the World Series, or the Stanley Cup, then the season amounted to nothing more than a failure. American Society just doesn’t acknowledge second, third, and fourth place finishes, and thus all but absolute supremacy is deemed total failure. During the winter of 2008 when all of my favorite teams were having less than stellar seasons, I stopped watching the traditional American sports and decided to approach soccer with an open mind. It was one the greatest decisions I ever made. After about two months of watching soccer and battling an addiction with FIFA Soccer 2009, 2008′s most popular soccer video game, I found myself engaged in each match. Soccer now brought with it the same emotion and energy that popular American sports had given me.

For the rest of the world, American sports are puzzling and excessively complex, specifically football and baseball. Soccer’s simplicity allowed me to turn on a game for the first time, and understand exactly what was going on. But while soccer is easy to pick up and play, it takes a lifetime to master. Though it may seem simple on the surface, the sport also has a startling amount of depth. As I became a more avid watcher of soccer matches I realized that it had all the aspects that drew me to the American sports I previously favored. The intensity and continuous struggle of football is matched by players pushing up the field to secure a goal. Players on and off the ball express the flash and finesse of basketball as they make graceful movements to create space and goal scoring opportunities. Slide tackles and last stitch efforts made by defenders maintain the grittier side of soccer that compares with hockey. And the scoring of goals in stoppage time rivals the suspense a walk off homerun and the late-inning drama of baseball. It combines some of the most desirable aspects of other sports, creating a game that is both physically demanding and highly enjoyable to watch.

German fans proudly wave their flag

Another distinction between soccer and American sports is the lack of pauses that stop the match altogether. It is a graceful game played with two 45-minute halves and a 15-minute half time period, while American sports are filled with timeouts and pauses that interrupt the flow of the game. Fans who attend matches are truly watching the game. Because soccer is both low-scoring and lacks continuous pauses there is always a feeling of anxiety throughout the match as spectators wait for that one moment of brilliance that can make all the difference. And as it gets later and later into the game it truly becomes a nerve-racking experience watching tired players play their hardest to secure the victory for their team and their fans. When a goal is scored the stadium erupts with pent-up excitement as fans cheer for their players to finish the game and keep fighting for a win. It is truly a remarkable experience that requires devoted attention from fans who are the most loyal and passionate of any sport. However, the obsession of soccer fans with their game also contributes to the negative image soccer has developed in the U.S.

Soccer fans are passionate people who truly win and lose with their teams. After losses they have often run rampant and formed violent mobs. No fan base is excluded from this category. All the major leagues of the world from the southern tip of Africa to the northern tip of Europe have participated in violent hooliganism both before and after soccer matches that have on many occasions resulted in deaths. This is an issue that needs to be dealt with and has not yet plagued American sports leagues to the extent it has soccer. However. this violence is a testament to just how seriously soccer fans take each and every match, and how soccer is more than just a sport to them. Just look at how many people attend the matches.

Over 150 soccer stadiums worldwide seat at least 50,000 people. In the United States not a single basketball or hockey arena seats 50,000. This is just how dedicated soccer fans are to supporting their teams. Fans truly pride themselves on their club teams, but an even more greater display of the cultural side to soccer is the international tournament that manages to unite the world for a month solely for the sport of soccer.

The Italian team celebrates after winning the 2006 World Cup

Once a small invitational tournament, the World Cup is has become a massively popular, globally televised event that attracts more attention than any other sporting event in the world. For one month every four years, thirty-two different nations compete in an international tournament with one eventually being crowned the champion. While Americans do acknowledge the World Cup as a major tournament, people in other countries take off from work to express their national pride by either attending the tournament or watching their team play on television. It was estimated that 715 million or one ninth of the world watched the final in 2006 that saw Italy emerge as champions. That’s 1/9 of the world’s population, or more than twice the U.S. population. Soccer hardly needs the U.S. to succeed; it has the world at its back.

The debate on which sport is most compelling only occurs in America. The rest of the world has already chosen soccer. Maybe it is a result of American ideologies and our desire to always be different from Europe. While we do offer a more diverse variety of sports, failing to integrate soccer into our culture means that  many Americans miss out on a sport that is truly amazing which has captured the world’s attention. The rest of the world has already shown its devotion to the grace and brilliance of soccer, and as the 2010 FIFA World Cup nears, it’s time for Americans to watch the game of soccer and understand why it is so important that we respect the sport as well.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/trumpetca/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7amanito/ / CC BY-NC 2.0
http://www.flickr.com/photos/soldiersmediacenter/ / CC BY 2.0
http://www.flickr.com/photos/miss_l/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

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