Soccer For Dummies, By A Dummy. Review on Soccer

Why do some people call the game soccer when the entire world except Northern America refers to it as Football? I’ll come to that later but you can, for the moment, toy with the question while you read this dummified... er, simplified view of the game.

People who prefer individual sports to team sports may ask, "why are 11 players required to put one ball into just one goalpost? One player on either side or an additional player (as in doubles) to defend the goalpost could have sufficed." If you look at our hockey team this is exactly what happens most of the time. One player clings to the ball for so long that you get the impression he is just a one-man team playing against 21 other players. Does that by any chance remind you of our adorable Bollywood heroes who single-handedly knock the daylights out of 20 menacing thugs?

Whether it reminds you of Bollywood or not but it does remind me, from a different perspective, of another breed of players who love giving their team mates a chance instead of finishing of the game on their own – our highly valued cricket team. Compare this with our hockey players who once they get hold of the ball never give a chance to their team members and want to finish it off on their own. Both our hockey and cricket teams use the wrong tactics with disastrous results. We find the psyche of cricket dominating in hockey and that of hockey in cricket, which could be an interesting research topic.

Back to Soccer. Anyone who is a ‘soccer’ for the game knows that it is one of the most skillful games played with the least paraphernalia used. All you need is just a decent sized ball to let loose your imagination, and two goalposts at opposite ends to put the ball in, but be sure which one. Confused? Well, I meant the goalpost.

The greatest joy of this game however is running with the ball dribbling against opposition players, who fancy kicking your bu*t or snatching the ball, and beating the goalkeeper who will do anything to hold it in his hands unless you beat him to it. Obviously, the idea is to kick the ball into the opposition goal and for God’s sake don’t kick it in your own that might be very painful for you and your team. Some players also enjoy running after the ball without ever getting possession and some others enjoy running ahead of it without ever being in a position to receive it. The former lot are guilty of under-performing while the latter are trying to overachieve.

Football is one hell of a ball game where you can literally use your head while plotting the downfall of the opposition. But be sure to keep the ball in your possession for as long as you can and never give it to the opposition what is rightfully yours. But then, you will be branded as a selfish player who plays with his ball too much so once in a while allow your team-mates the luxury of playing with your ball before they start scratching their crotch. Well, most of the players tend to do that anyway since a recurring urge for heading the ball would have numbed their brains so much that scratching the crotch is a true reflection of where their secondary cerebral activity has assumed charge.

You’ve got to maintain the tempo for ninety minutes which is very taxing, putting it mildly.

Therefore, you are allowed a 15 minute break called ‘half-time’ where the coach (if you can afford one) takes charge and berates you for your ‘miss.’ After more advice, more drinks, and more adrenaline flow you are back on the field ploughing a lonely furrow. You believe your team-mates are not up to ‘scratch’. Like Maradona, you want to score on your own before your enthusiasm and energy flag.

The funny thing is this crazy activity is cheered by a hundred thousand even crazier people and watched by at least a billion of the most crazy people glued to their idiot boxes who sigh in anticipation when you have the ball and rise in raptures if you put it in.

Football is all about defending your fortress and at the same time impregnating the defence of your opposition. You need brains, but surprisingly most people use their legs and if you are Maradona you can get away with your hands too. But, if you are from England you keep whinging and dishing out excuses instead of trying to beat the opposition fair and square. Did I mention brains? Well, I meant what little of it is there because a recent study has shown that football players are the least cerebral among all other sportsmen.

What is most confusing to the uninitiated is why this beautiful game is called football as well as soccer since those who haven’t played the game assume one is different from the other as chalk is from cheese. Football originated in England, but some people who played this game unintentionally gave birth to Rugby and thereby hangs a tale.

Nobody is sure when Football originated but many agree it was in the Middle ages. It was a popular pastime for the youth of that time but the laws were rigid seeking to curb the enthusiasm of youth, as they were prone to disturb the neighbourhoods and Englishmen love their privacy. The game was mostly played by the masses. But the ruling class was slowly seduced by the sheer thrill the game had to offer.

One day at the Rugby School, a scion of the ruling gentry unable to control the ball with his feet decided to use a little bit of ingenuity to beat the opposition. He picked up the ball with his hands and ran towards the goal and placing it just before the post kicked it in. He obviously believed belonging to an aristocratic family nobody would penalise him. Later events proved how justified his belief was.

If the boys behaviour was shocking the school authorities approach was just as disturbing. To justify his cheating, and presumably appease his parents, the masters decided that what their dear boy played was the new ‘school brand’ of football called "Rugby football."

To distinguish that "game for louts played by gentlemen" from proper football "a game for gentlemen played by louts" - "Association football" was coined as soon as the Football Association regulated the game (so that people could make money from it?)

In those days it was the fad to add ‘er’ to everything that caught the fancy of the English people.

So, Rugby came to be called Rugger and Assoc Football (Short for Association Football) came to be called Soc’er or more popularly Soccer. Many years hence, Rugby Football began to be called just Rugby and because there was no more confusion most people reverted to original name Football to describe Soccer. The name Soccer would have died a natural death but for the ingenious Americans who created their own brand of football called American Football though their feet are used only for running and not for playing with the ball. As time passed, the name ‘American’ was dropped and the game was just known as Football. When the immensely popular real football was introduced in America it lead to a name confusion. So the Americans picked the long forgotten name Soccer and gave it a new lease of life. In America, the real football is called Soccer and their own brand of Rugby is called Football. In the rest of the world, however, Soccer is known as Football. Whew, that was one intriguing tale of football history, the real football I mean.

So, now you know what name to use and, more importantly, whether you should use hands or legs to play the game depending upon the country’s definition of what the game of Football is.

mbfarookh.