I love soccer, but FIFA and the world cup COMPLETELY SUCKS
I've played soccer since I was 5, and love the sport. Scoring a goal can be a transcendent experience, much better than hitting a grand slam or dunking or really anything similar from another sport. When everything lines up just right and it goes in the back of the net, well there's just no better sport to play. That doesn't necessarily translate to a great sport to watch on TV, and FIFA has a lot of work to do if they want to build a real American audience. I don't really care if the rest of the world likes soccer just as it is - I want it better and here's how:
1. More goals. I don't care what you do, just make it happen. It's ridiculous how often the better team loses or ties. The defense in soccer at that level has all the advantages. Think about how often a possession turns into a goal in soccer. Pretty much never. Makes it damn boring and the score often doesn't match the real performance on the field. They could make the goal bigger, or make it illegal to have more than 8 players on the defensive side of the half, or test out a bunch of ideas and see what happens. For the love of God make more goals happen!
2. Offsides. This is the most boring rule in all of sports. It kills breakaways, is understood by only the most hardcore soccer fans, and makes for boring, lame, shitty to watch goals when it breaks down. Watching teams battle it out by depending on the linesman to get the right call every time is not fun to watch.
3. Fix the fucking ball. Instead of being sell-out whores, why not just use a ball that isn't a piece of shit? Other tournaments have no problem finding a fucking work-able soccer ball, what a shame that they can't.
4. Instant replay. FIFA: Seriously, step into the goddamn previous century and use all those expensive-ass cameras. Instead of letting fuck-ups by referees decide games, why don't you pretend like it's not 1905 anymore and make the right call happen. Inexcusably stupid.
5. Camera work. I usually don't have any complaints about the way other sports are shot, but clearly no one has figured out how to film a soccer game even half-decently. You have to be zoomed in so the dudes fill the frame in order to see all the skill involved, but with no warning the ball could be flying 50+ yards away. It's obvious that you should just stop showing it truly live and build in enough buffer so the camera work zooms in for all the skill work and cuts away at the exact right moment. It would also be nice to see all of the field and how the off-ball players are moving. Maybe make a split screen with a close-up next to a wide angle shot. You've got HD widescreen tvs out there - act like it.
6. The announcers. I'm sorry but the announcers suck and are mostly boring. I know it must be very hard to find anyone who can ID all the players on both teams on sight and who know anything about them, or for that matter have anything to say. Try harder. The NBA finals have some great talent doing the call.
7. Fuck those vuvzelas. I'm sure it's fun for the fans to honk that shit at games. It's clearly fun. It's fun the same way it's fun to walk onto the subway and start acting out scenes from the Waterboy - fun for you, but not for anyone else. The filters don't do shit, it's still annoying as fuck. It drowns out any hope of the players talking, you can't even hear the fucking crowd screaming. It's constant and retarded. Make them 10x quieter or make em take 5x as much air to blow, I don't care. Hell I'd rather the announcers be in a soundproof box than hear that constant beehive drone.
8. Professional fouls & flopping. End that shit with extreme prejudice. As a fan, I don't want to see stupid injuries caused by malicious fouls. I don't want to see every piece of skill punished with an obvious foul, even if the douche who did it gets a yellow card. Players should get thrown out for flopping and that idiotic performance piece, where they act like they are hurt by covering their faces because they don't even know what body part should hurt. If there were more goals, players wouldn't be so willing to risk a card in a desperate attempt to draw a foul and get a shot on goal.
Fix that stuff, and soccer would become much more popular in the US. Who wouldn't like it more?
1. More goals. I don't care what you do, just make it happen. It's ridiculous how often the better team loses or ties. The defense in soccer at that level has all the advantages. Think about how often a possession turns into a goal in soccer. Pretty much never. Makes it damn boring and the score often doesn't match the real performance on the field. They could make the goal bigger, or make it illegal to have more than 8 players on the defensive side of the half, or test out a bunch of ideas and see what happens. For the love of God make more goals happen!
2. Offsides. This is the most boring rule in all of sports. It kills breakaways, is understood by only the most hardcore soccer fans, and makes for boring, lame, shitty to watch goals when it breaks down. Watching teams battle it out by depending on the linesman to get the right call every time is not fun to watch.
3. Fix the fucking ball. Instead of being sell-out whores, why not just use a ball that isn't a piece of shit? Other tournaments have no problem finding a fucking work-able soccer ball, what a shame that they can't.
4. Instant replay. FIFA: Seriously, step into the goddamn previous century and use all those expensive-ass cameras. Instead of letting fuck-ups by referees decide games, why don't you pretend like it's not 1905 anymore and make the right call happen. Inexcusably stupid.
5. Camera work. I usually don't have any complaints about the way other sports are shot, but clearly no one has figured out how to film a soccer game even half-decently. You have to be zoomed in so the dudes fill the frame in order to see all the skill involved, but with no warning the ball could be flying 50+ yards away. It's obvious that you should just stop showing it truly live and build in enough buffer so the camera work zooms in for all the skill work and cuts away at the exact right moment. It would also be nice to see all of the field and how the off-ball players are moving. Maybe make a split screen with a close-up next to a wide angle shot. You've got HD widescreen tvs out there - act like it.
6. The announcers. I'm sorry but the announcers suck and are mostly boring. I know it must be very hard to find anyone who can ID all the players on both teams on sight and who know anything about them, or for that matter have anything to say. Try harder. The NBA finals have some great talent doing the call.
7. Fuck those vuvzelas. I'm sure it's fun for the fans to honk that shit at games. It's clearly fun. It's fun the same way it's fun to walk onto the subway and start acting out scenes from the Waterboy - fun for you, but not for anyone else. The filters don't do shit, it's still annoying as fuck. It drowns out any hope of the players talking, you can't even hear the fucking crowd screaming. It's constant and retarded. Make them 10x quieter or make em take 5x as much air to blow, I don't care. Hell I'd rather the announcers be in a soundproof box than hear that constant beehive drone.
8. Professional fouls & flopping. End that shit with extreme prejudice. As a fan, I don't want to see stupid injuries caused by malicious fouls. I don't want to see every piece of skill punished with an obvious foul, even if the douche who did it gets a yellow card. Players should get thrown out for flopping and that idiotic performance piece, where they act like they are hurt by covering their faces because they don't even know what body part should hurt. If there were more goals, players wouldn't be so willing to risk a card in a desperate attempt to draw a foul and get a shot on goal.
Fix that stuff, and soccer would become much more popular in the US. Who wouldn't like it more?
Labels: assininity, fifa, soccer, world cup
posted by Dave Rants at
4:16 PM
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