Maradona

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Originally posted by Koa
Oooh I had no idea so many people didn't know about Maradona...it's one of those names we give from granted here (as you from other sides of the world may give for granted other people...).

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Me neither. I'm astonished. I was curious about this topic. Interesting turn of events.

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Originally posted by Koa
Well crisaor, of course in Italy the mass media are talking a lot about him as probably the best part of his career was spent in Naples... I dont know much about that times cos I wasnt into football (soccer for Americans, but I speak British, posh me) at the time... but it certainly remained in the history of sport.

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Yes. That was his finest moment along with the Mexico World Cup (and maybe the Championship with Boca in the '81 :D). He practically led the team on his own, just like he did with Argentina.

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Originally posted by Koa
Here in Italy football is one of the basis of life. Really, this damn country is based on football, it gets 99% of the attention in all the medias, leaving the 1% to all other sports. So it feels so strange to me to talk to people who dont know much about it, as it's something else I give or take for granted The world is really wide...
I used to be very into sports a few years ago, now I dont follow them much anymore, unless there are big events...

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So Koa, do you support any soccer team in particular?

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Originally posted by ajoe
Wait, is it Brazil or Brasil?

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It's Brasil in the original (portuguese). The same goes for spanish. In english, it's Brazil.

I had only heard the name once I came to the UK. The US hardly cares about soccer at all. Everywhere else it seems like a way of life. While I'm here in England I support Arsenal. *Curses at Chelsea under breath* The premiership is the only league that I really know ANYTHING about though. So I don't really know anything about Maradona, just the name.

Ha, Kik, have you seen the Colin Firth movie Fever Pitch? He's a teacher, and his life parallels how Arsenal is faring in the playoffs :)

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Originally posted by IWilKikU
I had only heard the name once I came to the UK. The US hardly cares about soccer at all. Everywhere else it seems like a way of life. While I'm here in England I support Arsenal. *Curses at Chelsea under breath* The premiership is the only league that I really know ANYTHING about though. So I don't really know anything about Maradona, just the name.

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Congratulations then. The Arsenal has won the championship, if I'm not mistaken. BTW, don't go around calling the name of Maradona, the englishs don't like him very much. And for good reasons. Try to see his second goal against England in Mexico '86. I'll doubt you'll ever see a goal as good as that.

It doesn't matter how Arsenal fares in the Premiership playoffs, because they were eliminated by Chelsea in the European Championship league :( :(. Oh, and thanks for the heads up Cris, I'll keep that in mind, but honestly to me a goal looks like a goal. I guess I'm just an uncultured philistine. :(

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Originally posted by crisaor
Congratulations then. The Arsenal has won the championship, if I'm not mistaken. BTW, don't go around calling the name of Maradona, the englishs don't like him very much. And for good reasons. Try to see his second goal against England in Mexico '86. I'll doubt you'll ever see a goal as good as that.

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...the hand of god??? :D was it then?

Crisaor, as for your question (sorry I'm bad at quoting), at the moment I hardly care for football so I dont support any teams in particular, I only have a sympathy for a local team called Chievo, a team from a small part of my city who managed to get to the main league (serie A) and stay there for years, fighting at the same level of 'big' teams (and when i say big, I mean their budgets!!!), which is interesting in these times when sport is ruled by money and tv broadcasts (which are the reasons why I lost my interest in sports, especially football).
I used to be a great fan of Fiorentina because of Batistuta!!! That's also where my interest from Argentina came from... But the team has been swallowed by debts, as happened to my favourite basketball team too...so I'm sportless now :D

Count me in with those who never heard of Maradona. I've never understood American football. I'd much rather watch soccer, but since we don't get cable, the chances of that are rather slim, though sometimes it comes on the spanish channels. But like Em, I'm not a big sports fan either. My husband loves watching football so I just stitch away, basically ignoring it. Soccor is more exciting, they don't need all that wimpy padding that American football players use!

my love is 6 feet and 260/270, was a college lineman (actually small as far as lineman go, and short to boot)...he's not wimpy or weak but it does help to have padding when it comes to taking a beating from someone bigger than you!

Sorry amuse, I guess I've let all that pent up energy from years of watching a sport I didn't understand come out. When football season is in, that's what's blaring though the house and it's been that way since I can remember.

it's ok Shea, i don't understand it either! his little brother tried to explain it to me a couple of years ago though...:D

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Originally posted by Koa
...the hand of god??? :D was it then?

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Yes, that was then. But that was his first goal. I don't like it that much. The second is the important one. He practically passed 9 english players before scoring. Everytime I hear the comment on that goal I get the shivers, but in a good way.

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Originally posted by Koa
Crisaor, as for your question (sorry I'm bad at quoting), at the moment I hardly care for football so I dont support any teams in particular, I only have a sympathy for a local team called Chievo, a team from a small part of my city who managed to get to the main league (serie A) and stay there for years, fighting at the same level of 'big' teams (and when i say big, I mean their budgets!!!), which is interesting in these times when sport is ruled by money and tv broadcasts (which are the reasons why I lost my interest in sports, especially football).

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I know that team. You're from Verona then?

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Originally posted by Koa
I used to be a great fan of Fiorentina because of Batistuta!!! That's also where my interest from Argentina came from... But the team has been swallowed by debts, as happened to my favourite basketball team too...so I'm sportless now :D

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Yeah. Shame about that one. But it's a sign that things work there (despite your favourite club went bankruptcy). Here, some teams are saved (only the ones some of the politicians support) and the poor ones suffer the same fate of the fiorentina, or worse.

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Originally posted by crisaor


Here, some teams are saved (only the ones some of the politicians support) and the poor ones suffer the same fate of the fiorentina, or worse. [/B]

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Well...do you think that the real important ones wouldnt be saved? Roma and Lazio are swimming in debts but still going, and I doubt that Milan would ever have to face any problem (and I'm not going to discuss further about how referees seem to favout it, but if you know his owner you know everything about it)... the government in the past week has been discussing about some sort of decree to save football... This country is really based on football...oops...soccer :D

Yeah I'm from Verona, I thought everybody knew but since I removed that info from my profile, I guess I have to remind it sometimes ;)

I'd just like to clear somthing up about American Football:

First of all, someone said something about the players being whimpy and needing padding. Well, these guys slam into eachother at breakneck speeds, and are permenantly injured often despite thier "whimpy pads", and have you ever seen a soccer player get kicked in the shin, they fall down and cry like its the end of the world. "WAAAAAAHHHH! SOMEONE STEPPED ON MY FOOOOOOOOOTT! WAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHAAAAHHHAAAA!!!" Come on! American Football players are the real gladiators of modern sports. The only other sport that comes close is rugby. Even Hockey players are more mighty than soccer players. American football players, brutes, Soccer players, artists.

Money:
American football is the last remaining professional sport with a salary cap. This dissallows clubs from selling alot of merchandise and than using those funds to monopolize the player market. Other sports have salary caps, but they have a luxery tax that the club can pay to exceed it, making the orginization even more money. I'm disgusted with sporting economics, but US football is a close as the world comes to keeping the sport based on Athletes and coaching rather than who can afford who.

Thats all I have to say about that.

*starts to say something about the gazillions of dollars spent each year on novelty football merchandise, tickets, concessions, million-dollar-Superbowl-ad-spots, players hawking fast food and soda in commercials* *stops herself* My lips is zipped. :p Clearly I must concede the cap is due to the NFL's high level of integrity concerning athleticism.

:p. Don't missinterpret me em! Its silly to think that American football isn't a huge capitalist gimmick, but for the most part they keep the economics off the field itself. The Yankee's, the Lakers, and Manchester United all can afford to pay their players WAAAAAAYYY more than the competing teams. So the best players go there. So those teams win championships. It CANNOT work like that in American Football. The negative effects of the Salary cap are that players usually don't stay on a team for more than about 4 years. There's no team loyalty among the players anymore :(:(. But at least a team can't buy the superbowl.

Also, there is a huge amount of advertising DURING THE COMMERCIALS of football events, esp. the Superbowl. But the Premiership teams actually have thier sponsers logos on thier jerseys. I can't even tell what team a players on. At a glance it looks like the Vodafones are playing Oranges. Stupid advertising. Yuk!

Didn't I already say "That's all I have to say about that"? :D