The World Cup is in its second week, which means across this country hundreds of sportswriters and talk show hosts have begun their quadrennial exercise in soccer bashing. It happens every four years, the jingoistic exclamations that our sports are better than theirs; that the United States is right and the rest of the world is wrong; that soccer is boorrrring. Don’t bother learning about the game. It’s easier to make fun of the 0-0 ties between Paraguay and Bulgaria, and Netherlands and Belgium. . . . It’s easy to make fun of it because it’s so, well, foreign. For many of my colleagues, soccer is curling with a heat index. It’s the sport where the postgame show takes place in the streets with bands of hooligans performing plastic surgery on each other’s faces. . . . Soccer in this country is an acquired taste. It is a subtle game in a country that worships points and touchdowns and home runs. It is gradual gratification, not instant. Sure, there aren’t many goals in soccer, but the game is about the constant threat of the score. Every minute is dangerous. Every run could be the one that swings the match. . . . Pele called it the beautiful game. He was right.
More Top Picks Honeywell Digital Ceramic Hce322v