gooooaaaaaaaaal

You either get soccer or you don’t. Some look at the sport as a bunch a guys chasing a ball and passing it around for 90 minutes, with games routinely ending in 1-0 scores. A bunch of slim, pretty boy dudes in shorts and high socks diving at the first hint of contact and acting as if they’ve been shot. They see soccer and they see boring. However, for some, it is strategy, precision, athleticism, competition and grace all rolled into one…a sport that runs with a continuous clock for its entire length (save a 15 min break after 45 min) and requires an immense amount of running and cardio vascular fitness to go along with the prerequisite foot/eye co-ordination. Every chance is a slow build to a potential climax…a string of passes and maneuvers as 10 players attempt to breach the other teams defense and shoot the ball past a 'keeper' into a large, but considering the size of the playing field, reasonably sized net.

Of course, I’m biased as I played the sport competitively from the time I was 6 until I was in my early 20’s in a country where hockey is king, and soccer was, when I was a kid, barley a blip on the sports radar. It wasn’t cool to be into soccer…or play it. But where my parents are from originally, soccer is THE sport…and it isn’t even called soccer, its called by its proper name…football (which makes a whole lot more sense than the North American definition)
Growing up, I was thrust into the sport pretty young…my parents were big proponents of children being active all the time, be it soccer and baseball in the summer and indoor soccer and swimming in the winter, to go along with numerous summer camps. And that was outside of school…extra curricular if you will. In school, it was indoor hockey during recess, track and field after school. For a brief shining moment, I was a true 5 tool athlete…I could play pretty much any sport and automatically be pretty good at it…and usually, I would be one of the best of my peers. Soccer was no different.

I was pretty good…could play any position…was even a goalkeeper for my first year…and stepped into net during the championship game another year and saved and then kicked the game winning penalty kick (with a picture of me, being chased by my teammates making the front page of the local sports page…) I played at a fairly high level from about year 4 on…mostly as a midfielder...and at an especially high level during my mid teen years (when every boy wants to play professional {enter sport of choice here}). So…to say I have a deep respect and love for the sport is an understatement.

I’ve also followed the sport pretty closely most of my life as well…not as close as the 4 major North American sports…but I’ve been an Everton supporter almost as long as I’ve been a Toronto Maple Leafs supporter (and I have no clue as to why I like either to tell you the truth…)…and come World Cup time, our house became England (and to a lesser degree Scotland) soccer central. All the games got Olympic type treatment…I mean, I was allowed to ‘skip’ class a couple of times to stay home and watch the games, that’s how much my parents were into it.

Now, the global scope of the sport and our country’s (and Toronto in particular) growing multiculturalism…to go along with the 500 channel/24 hour global media age we find ourselves in…has resulted in events such as the World Cup, UEFA Champions League, and the current global obsession, the European Championships grabbing the same type of attention in a lot more homes it seems…with front page headlines and coverage and immense fan interest. They have become truly global events.

Which is why it kind of sucks that I’m totally not into this time around.

Don’t get me wrong…I’ll probably watch a handful of games over at my parents place or at my buddies place (I still refuse to get cable)…but with England watching at home, and me a good 6 years removed from the last time I even played in a pick-up game, I just don’t have the same passion. Now, I could easily say that about any number of things, which is a whole other post in itself, but this one is about soccer, and the European Championships, so I’ll let that beast rest for another day.

As for my mighty prediction…I’m rooting for the Czech Republic, but I think that Germany and Spain are probably the two best teams, and usually the two best teams end up meeting up in the finals…with Italy the sleeping giant who could take the whole thing.

Final: Italy 2 – Spain 1


either way...lots of 'soft core 'man love' for your viewing pleasure.
nobody celebrates a goal quite like Italy and Spain.