Futebol

During the game



One thing I was looking forward to before coming to Brazil, was being here while the world cup is on. As one might expect, in general they have a very big interest in soccer here. But just as in Australia, not everyone's into cricket or rugby, not everyone here is into soccer. But when Brazil plays in the world cup - it seems like the whole country stops. During Brazil's second game (it was my first full day here in Floripa), I was in an electronics store, but it appeared all the "customers" were just using the demo tvs to watch the game - the staff too.

For Brazil's last couple of games I've been invited to a friend's place a 15 minute walk from where I live to watch it - there's been about 10 people there each time. Most people usually have work or study, but that doesn't matter. Likewise my Portuguese lessons at the school I'm at have been arrange around Brazil's games.

With that said, I was disappointed Brazil lost last game. there's been five games of Brazil playing and I was hoping for a couple more - for the atmosphere if nothing else! People seemed a bit sad afterwards, but picked themselves up pretty quickly.


Lunch after the game. Brazil lost, but you wouldn't know it by their smiles


Now for a few of my observations about the game. It seems to me that there's a couple of issues that should be sorted out.

Firstly, unlike most other major sports these days, they haven't introduced any technology to help the referees in making the correct call. This goal by England against Germany easily went over the line and should have counted http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkCnUTIWBAc
but the ref missed it. In a game where so few goals are scored, they really should do teams and fans justice by making sure goals count when they're supposed to. In the year 2010, technology is available to assist the refs in making this sort of decision (without slowing the game down). To add insult to injury the FIFA websites recap doesn't even admit the mistake but simply says "Meetings between these two sides often provide talking points and this one's came 60 seconds later when Lampard's shot from the edge of the box struck the underside of the crossbar and bounced down, with the referee ruling the ball had not crossed the goalie."

Secondly it seems to me that there's too many pansies who pretend to get hurt in order to get a call to go their way. In a game where a red card means the player is sent off (so that the team is down to 10 players) AND misses the next game, it can be rather harsh if they get penalised in this manner unfairly. Take this example where Kaka got a 2nd yellow card (and therefore missed the next match), when he didn't even appear to touch the other player's face.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkIQ6pRcvv8
Now the ref has to make the decision on the spot, but at the very least they could review the tape overnight to see if some if the yellow card was warranted and rescind it in a case like this so that he doesn't miss the next game. Furthermore they could look to penalise players for faking it so badly. But no they don't do that. The ref's call is final. I'm told soccer pride's itself on being a game with constant motion and just a few simple rules. But the thing is, it seems to (perhaps somewhat nievely) rely on players being honest. I think they need to amend the rules to discourage this sort of behaviour.

Lastly, I was disappointed Ghana last yesterday - I was really hoping that'd pull it out. That said, some people seem to feel that Uruguay won by cheating. In the final minute of extra time Ghana had what would have been a goal, but a Uruguay player used his hand to defend it. The result was a red card - meaning he missed the next match and Ghana got a free kick. While I really wanted Ghana to win and therefore am sad they missed the free kick (which mean the game then went to a penalty shootout where Uruguay won), I don't feel Uruguay cheated. In my opinion they made a last desperate attempt to save the goal - which paid off. If that's not meant to be part of the game, then again they should consider changing the rules such that its an automatic goal in these situations, rather than just a free kick.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qpTNnFFbr0