It's No Use, They JustDon't Like Football

Last week, I had to travel to the United States for work. Since I was already there, I took the opportunity to ask various Americans (and the Latinos didn’t count) the reasons why they can’t seem to fall in love with our football, which they call soccer.

Let’s look at seven answers that remind me of some of the reasons given by people I know who also, unfortunately, don’t know how great it is to follow a game and have a team to cheer for.

1. “The rules of the game are complicated” — It’s funny to hear this from an American. For someone who is used to the complicated rules of American football or baseball, understanding the basic rules of football shouldn’t be too difficult. Except for the off-side rule, which even referees and commentators can’t explain, it shouldn’t take too much effort to know what counts and what doesn’t during the 90 minutes of play.

2. “It’s a game for women and children” — There really are a lot of girls playing soccer in the USA, maybe because they’re not allowed to play American football or hockey, for example. Well, this theory is also not valid. Now volleyball, which was invented so women could practice some kind of sport because basketball was considered improper and too violent for ladies, is still a women’s sport to this day.

3. “There are matches where few points scored” — I also can’t agree with this, because the quality of a football match is not in the number of goals. A strong cultural component of the American sports fan is evident here. They know they can miss a shot in basketball or American football, but if they miss a goal in our football because they left to get a beer, they might have missed the only really exciting moment of the match.

4. “The game is too long” — Yet another comment that shows how Americans like to watch a sporting event. Any sport has to have a break so the fans can go to the bathroom, go get a beer or eat something. And this happens whether they are in front of a television or in a stadium (always well-served by fast food chains and, sometimes excellent restaurants). Even at races the yellow flags serve as a break. American sports fans cannot sit through 45 minutes to watch the halves of a soccer match.

5. “Teams don’t have to be aggressive to win” — This sentence really shows how the nephews of Uncle Sam do not understand the essence of our football. The greatest difference between football and other sports is in the fact that the worse team can beat the technically stronger team. This only happens in our football. The inability to know which team will win is the great magic of football.

6. “I get frustrated when there is no winner” — The American sports fan is also not used leaving a stadium or arena without there being a winning team, although sometimes there are ties in hockey. For them, it is necessary for one team to destroy the other. In other words, in sports there is no equality, only winners and losers.

7. “Because we haven’t won a World Cup” —In spite of hiring stars like Pelé in the 1970s and Beckham now, if the American team is not successful it is really unlikely that the sport will appeal to American fans. There is too much competition with sports like basketball, American football, baseball and hockey, without even mentioning sports like swimming and track and field. Without championships, the sport does not become popular, as can be seen with what happened with volleyball here in Brazil. The American women have already conquered various important titles, but we all know that the women’s tournaments don’t attract as much attention as the men’s World Cup.

It’s going to take a really long time before the American fan begins to like football. Or better yet, maybe it will never happen.

Till next time.