Three Reasons FIFA is Shooting Itself in the Foot
I think it is impossible to simultaneously be employed, watch every World Cup match, and be able to blog about it. Fortunately I am off work temporarily to recover from minor surgery; now I can blog more. Yay!
The tournament is really heating up now, and as more and more Americans tune in their viewing experience is being ruined in three ways, all of which can be mitigated by FIFA, the organizing body of the tournament. As the USA is the final, potentially very lucrative frontier for the growth of the game, the organizers really ought to get rid of the bad habits that are so thoroughly stereotyped by the non-soccer community.
IMHO here are the three most pressing problems with the 2010 tournament from the perspective of someone who wants soccer to grow in popularity in the USA:
1.) Vuvuzelas – Seriously, these annoying cheap plastic horns must be destroyed. They degrade the viewing experience on television and in the stadium and seem to cause communication problems among the players. In addition, I’ve had several American friends who are curious about the World Cup tune in for five minutes and then turn the television off because the din is so intolerable. Not good! Part of the appeal of soccer is the immense crowd noise, songs and chants; these are all but drowned out except for the 30,000-strong contingent of drunk, Empire-nostalgic England fans.
It would be nice if FIFA banned vuvuzelas for the knockout stages of the competition. Sepp Blatter’s rationalization for allowing the horns is that it’s part of the culture. I’m not sure about that, but am happy to concede that point because it is irrelevant. Here’s a simple reductio ad absurdum counterargument. What if blowing on whistles incessantly was part of South African culture? FIFA would never allow anyone but the referee to have a whistle. How about bringing guns into the stadium and shooting them in the air when the home team scores? Yes, Dallas Cowboys fans, I’m talking about you. Too bad you are all illiterate.
It is time for FIFA to pull its head out of its ass and stop being needlessly sensitive about “culture”.
PleasePleasePrettyPleaseWithACherryOnTop, get rid of the vuvuzelas.
2.) Diving – By being relatively lenient towards players who act as though they have been shot in the face, FIFA is bringing the entire sport into disrepute. The advent of slow-motion replays in high definition give soccer skeptics a lot of ammunition; American sports sites like Deadspin have nightly roundups of the most transparent, shameless flops.
In order for more Americans to be brought into the fold, there must be comprehensive reform to the punishment for diving. As it stands now, the worst a flopper can expect is a yellow card. I think you would see behavioral changes if the penalty for diving was a red card and/or a five-match ban and/or point reductions. This brings us to the third problem:
3.) Luddite Attitudes Regarding Technology – The position of FIFA towards technology has generally been that there should be no differences between how the game is played at the highest professional level and how it is played at the most local, amateur level. It’s time for FIFA to recognize that this attitude is quaint and counterproductive.
For example, the United States was very nearly screwed out of the tournament by having two legitimate goals disallowed by comical refereeing. If this happened, the backlash in the American media and among the troglodytes in Sarah Palin’s Real ‘Merica would have been merciless and could have set American soccer back years.
Whether it’s goal-line technology, video evidence for punishing the Italian Diving Team, or artificial intelligence to make offside calls, FIFA must allow the precision of the referee’s calls to stand up to the intense scrutiny coming from television.
We will need to make progress on these fronts before soccer can truly break into the mainstream of American sporting consciousness.
Now, for your enjoyment here’s Jozy Altidore getting huge air as he swan dives into the mandatory celebratory pile-up.
I think an automatic video review of every goal would help immensely. Since so few goals are scored , each goal is very important. This would prevent unjust referee decisions; whether it’s disallowing a legal goal, or allowing an illegal goal (Argentina vs Mexico). Reviewing a goal would not slow down the “free flowing pace” of the game.
Diving; You could extend this to the obvious-after-review dives, with after the game penalties.