Scores of Cup arrests in Germany

<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/5081684.stm>

"More than 400 people were arrested in Germany after clashes around the World Cup match between the host nation and Poland, police have said.
All but three were released after a night in cells, but more than 100 face further investigation.

Police said trouble flared ahead of the match, as they tried to arrest "violent hooligans in the city centre"."

Why do soccer fans go crazy and attack each other? Between the racism and violence I think it will be best for everyone involved if the game is banned. Too many people get hurt.

I don't understand why watching soccer brings out the worst in people.

the culprits, but then again why do people here in America, feel a need to loot and burn their city when their teams win a championship?

:rofl:

If the whole world acted as Americans do about soccer, we'd really be in trouble.

If it weren't for the rioting, there would be no action whatsoever.

I'm sick and tired of the pro-soccer idiots trying to bring that sorry excuse for a sport here. Just what we need, soccer hooligans rioting in our streets...no thanks!

Your dislike of the game has nothing to do with criminal behavior. Crime happens at a lot of big events, even "small" ones like the super bowl.

As a pro-soccer "idiot" I find your comment to be completely absurd. I can't believe I'm reading something like this here on D.U. As if our country is already free from riots and "hooligans," and playing soccer would suddenly send our country into a violent frenzy. By the way, what makes soccer a "sorry sport" compared to all the other sports? Just curious where your bias comes from.

...but I won't. Ignorance is obviously bliss in his case, and I certainly wouldn't want to harsh
on his mellow.

Rioting fans are not unheard of in the US: I recall a fair bit of hooliganism in Denver a few years back after their team won some football championship or another, and I'm sure that wasn't the only case.

Some of the 1994 World Cup games were held in my town in northern California. We had a lot of rather enthusiastic fans from overseas (yes, I went even though I'm not a big soccer fan - how often do I get a chance to walk to the major sporting event in the world?), and no riots occurred. The Brazilians did manage to party all night every night for a couple of weeks on every available street corner, but while noisy, they were friendly. I was in Paris in 2004 the evening France won the European quarter-final: it was like those old newsreels of VE Day with people hugging strangers in the streets.

You don't like a sport, then do what I do and ignore it.

CHARGES OF COCAINE USE. While campaigning for the presidency in 2000, Bush was quick to answer some questions about his personal life. He was candid when he denied having extramarital affairs since his 1977 marriage. Rumors floated that Bush had smoked pot and snorted cocaine during his partying days in the 1970s. He acknowledged that he had been arrested for a college prank at Yale where he stole a Christmas wreath. And he had another run- in with law enforcement authorities while at Yale after he and other students tried to tear down the goal posts after a football game with Princeton. Bush acknowledged having a drinking problem until he made the decision to quit in 1986 at the age of 40. But he never admitted to having any arrests -- until a story broke only five days before Election Day.

GEORGE W. BUSH'S EARLY YEARS


Among all his "achievements" (liar, fraud, drunk driver, thief, failed businessman, military deserter, etc) we can add "hooliganism" to his resume.

BUSH IS A HOOLIGAN! BUSH IS A HOOLIGAN!!!

enjoy your short stay on DU. I don't think you'll be welcome here by most people. Ignorant, hateful, and stupid post.

I agree that his expression of dislike was strongly worded, but a far cry from bigotry.

He's obviously not worth arguing with and yes, he is a bigot.

These folks coordinate their meetings to have mass brawls near soccer matches. They don't actually watch the games; stuff like this doesn't happen inside the stadiums.

That you - one person - is able to post links to all events ever reported seems to be a good indicator.

The Liverpool tragedy was the peak of the whole Hooligan problem; since then the organizers have learned a lot of lessons. It is that 2o-year old event which seems to be the mental image many people have from soccer.

Today, soccer stadiums are pretty much without fences whatsoever. Streakers are considered a bigger problem than hooligans.

Hell, if there were some nice female streakers at the local stadium, I might consider sitting through two hours of soccer humdrum just to see them :evilgrin:

Think male and drunk; with " golden palace.com " painted on the back. But there's always hope, I guess.

that was in 1985. Things have changed since then, except for a very small minority of hooligans who aren't interested in football for the sport anyway.

Using your logic, why don't we judge America in 2006 by the way the country treated blacks before the civil rights days? It makes about as much sense.

Anything big event will create issues good and bad. Soccer has nothing to do with it.

You want to ban football, the most popular sport on the planet. And you think that this ban would SOLVE the problem of violence!?
Do Americans never have sports riots? Maybe you don't... but trust me, it is a pretty small percentage involved. There's no sense in ruining it for everyone else.

I trust you're speaking about soccer...

Who, on this planet, plays football?
Except that little minority on that small remote northern american continent?
^_^

Which, of course, everyone else rightly calls football. ;-)

Considering that the terms "football" AND "soccer" both originated in England...

There were opposing views about whether it was right to run with the ball or not, and in the end
two codes were decided on - one was Association Football (Soccer), in which it is forbidden to
run with the ball, and the other was Rugby Football, in which it is permitted to run with the ball.
Colloquially, they came to be known in England as Rugby (or rugger), and Football (meaning Soccer).

To complicate matters, in Australia we have the British version of Rugby, known as Rugby Union, and
the (to my mind rougher) version known as Rugby League. Union has a smaller following, and tends
to be considered more of a "gentleman's game", with a strong tradition in private schools.

Then we have Australian Rules football, which for a long time was played only in Victoria and South
Australia - I have no idea how it differs from League, because I don't follow either.

The ones who wanted to play by the Association (Assoc.) rules were called "Assoccers", but the name of the game was later shortened to "soccer" (perhaps because of the vulgar way that "Ass-occer" could be corrupted? :evilgrin: ).

Our football was derived from rugby in that both sports mark their fields much like a gridiron; both use balls that are not round (no dirty minds, please); and both have goalposts through which the ball can be kicked to score points via a field goal.

"ball", as opposed to American football, where there's almost no kicking, save field goals. I've been in the US for 12 years and being a big fan of the sport, i still find it weird to use the term "soccer".

...and the kicked object is a ball, not an ellipsoid.

Hence foot-ball. Capisce?

When the Association and rugby footballers split in the 1860s, the rugby version, called "rugby football" was brought to North America where it began to catch on, in modified forms in both Canada and the US. Since the New World versions began to differ from the original, and since a lot of footwork was involved in the sport (both in kicking, and running), it was natural that the term "rugby football" was shortened to just "football" in both the US in Canada. Meanwhile, the Association football game came to be known as "Assoccer" from Assoc., the abbreviation for "Association". But apparently "Assoccer" didn't sound too polite when said in a certain way, so the name was changed to "soccer". Thus, it would be natural for Americans to adopt this word ("soccer") for the Association version of game.

On the other hand, when the Association version of the game began to catch on in Europe, it was called "Association football", but since it, too, involved a lot of footwork, it is natural that Europeans would also shorten the name to "football".

So both terms are appropriate in their respective settings.

By the way, "soccer football" also involves use of the head, knees and thighs. And the goalkeeper can use his hands.

I'm guessing you know this already.

and footy can mean Rugby, League or Union, or Australian Rules.

But I learned the rules of the game in England, where you'd be completely
misunderstood if you called soccer anything other than football.

Except to daft Americans who refer to their wierd version of rugby, in which feet play a decisively secondary role, as football.

That's why American football is called "football" -- because it's derived from rugby football. Australian Rules Football also gets the "football" part of its name from rugby football, too. In fact, rugby players are still known as "footballers" in a lot of places.

Association football = "football" and "soccer"

Rugby football = "rugby" and "Australia rules football" and ... "football"

How did this confusion happen? Long story, but in brief, the 19th century English guys who exported the two sports to the U.S., Australia, Canada, etc., weren't on the same page with one another.

Football. Soccer. Football=Soccer. American Football, they play in spandex :loveya: heißt Ami Fußball. American Football=Ami Fußball.

There's still no logical reason to go back to calling your variant on a variant the original name. I suggest "Americaball" or possibly "Forward-Passball". Australian Rules Football is more closely related to Gaelic football, though, I think. Besides, Australians call almost everything football.

Australians call soccer, "soccer".

Hooligans will start a riot at a local pub curling tournament if that's all there was. Some people get
it, and others do not. Watcha gonna do?

we haven't fully evolved out of it.

Hooligans aren't Football Fans. They are people using events like these to stir up trouble.
250000 were peacefully watching the game together in Berlin I think. It's bringing together many nations who are mainly friendly to each other.

Banning the game because of some idiots? That's a great solution...

in particular ways, but "banning" footie (again, so lacking feasibility as to be downright stupid) would do nothing to address the underlying problems. They would just manifest themselves in another area.

Did that cause violence to go somewhere else?

The act of footie itself is not. Nice apples and oranges though. :eyes:

Your contention is that banning a sport can't be done. I gave the example og dog fighting as a sport that was banned. I said nothing about the relative moral aspects of the 2 activities.

My contention is that banning footie is not feasible, not that banning a "sport" in general (whatever that might mean) can't be done. I won't even go into the differences in kind, scale, relative establishment, economics, form, and public perception between footie and dog fighting, since they are obvious to everyone, such that the argument you put forth doesn't even work in the extremely rarified, abstract space that construct here for it. Ask ten people on the street the difference between dog fighting and football, and then come back to me. It's ridiculous.

The second argument is, of course, that even if you could ban football, it would do nothing to address the problems of violence and racism that glom on to it.

So you don't like soccer? So you want most of the planet to stop watching it becasue of a compartively few who want to spoil it?

Drunk drivers kill people every day in the US because they drive drunk. I have an idea, lets ban alcohol for everyone because of the few idjuts that get behind the wheel and drive drunk....OOOPS....it's been done.....didn't work. Next argument puleeze:eyes:

:rofl:

Your comparison of a barbaric practice to a sport loved my millions around the world shows your ignorance. How does a team sport in which the objective is to score more goals than the other team relate in any way to training two beautiful animals to rip each other apart?

I did not. I just said both were "sporting" activities and if one were made illegal then maybe both could be made illegal. As I said above I made no comment on the comparative moral worthiness of both activities.

To place both footie and dog-fighting in the same category as "sporting events" may satisfy your bizarre obsession, but it is so abstract as to be meaningless. In your lofty abstract realm, they are both "sporting events," so banning one is in principle the same as banning the other (as other posters have pointed out, even this abstraction is dubious, since defining dog fighting as a "sporting event" is questionable on its face). In the real world, the grounded world, the world of concreteness and pragmatism, the two have virtually nothing in common - even if we were to grant the extremely questionable common category, so any comparison is ridiculous, as I've said. But play your abstract word games, by all means. It's an amusing exercise in bad sophistry, at the very least.

Those are your words, not mine.

And is now tied to the dog-fighting nonsense, and so must defend the indefensible (and I'm talking about his argument, not the brutal practice of dog-fighting).

they turn over cars and set em on fire in Lansing after big games...

It's not the students, usually, either, but townies or visitors from out of town. Football's pretty big here, so some get out of hand.

They do the same on High Street in Columbus after big games for Ohio State, too. It's a thing that happens.

Plus hundreds of smaller parties :toast:

There are some people here, who seem to think soccer is some evil force. I don't get it, but I guess a distant(and absurd) reason for distant crimes is all some people need. I see that reducing humanity's problems to one game can seem like a great idea - the simplicity of the explanation.

They also seem to miss the percentage of reports about crimes near soccer matches picked up by the media - it's almost 100%; way higher than crimes happening in other settings.

that where they have been, there has been NO trouble at all... Just a lot of people schmoozing, drinking and loving soccer:) As a Mom, I am glad he's staying away fromt he "hooligans"..:)

we're having a REAL GOOD TIME in these parts. Flags are EVERYWHERE and even the Germans get to take part and wave 'em! Anyone travelling by train in this country is being treated to an eyefull!!!

The atmosphere is Karnevalesque. Nur Spass (just fun) and I'm so stoked! I've been able to "WATCH THE GAME" as I define it... DO NOT DISTURB. Tante K. is watching her soap. NO she will not get you a beer and please keep your voice down. Such a luxury!

And all those "RIOT" reports :boring:... Assholes are being arrested and removed from the area.

Doing something as idiotic as "banning" football (and who, precisely, would have the power to do that?) would do nothing to solve either racism or the violence associated with hooliganism. Read Bill Buford's excellent account Among the Thugs. Hooliganism emerges at the complex intersection of race, class, locality, and nationality, and has relatively little to do with footie, in fact. But, of course, you were joking, because nobody would make such a silly suggestion seriously, right?

Feared for my eyeballs ever since. That is why I stay away from soccer fans.

Yesterday evening a friend of mine was in Stuttgart, soutwestern Germany.
It was a 'public viewing' event in Downtown Stuttgart, the actual match
took place in Dortmund.
70000 people having a great party, lots of beer and everything draped in
the colours of Germany and Poland. Guess what?
Completely peaceful party.

But of course that wouldn't make a juicy headline.

Security is being held at 'high' after the Poland - Germany match for the England match today. There are 100K English in Nuremberg.

Great book, right?

Thank You

LBN Moderator

Or a Phillies' game. Talk about HOOLIGANS? The cops actually had a jail and magistrate's office set up in the gone but never forgotten gritty bowels of Vet...

making some mystical connection between hooliganism and footie exclusively. What's this "none of you people" business?

Urban rednecks, free-flowing beer, and sporting events... scary.

They literally ripped everything my friend brought to the game apart because she was wearing a headband with a tiny NY Giants logo. Yep, what a big tough bunch of guys they were...destroying the stuff of a 5'5" 100lb girl.

Yeah, ban soccer! Even though every other sport sees the same thing.

Hell, a tennis match in Argentina sparked a riot within the stadium.

Let's just ban all sports...that'll solve it! :sarcasm: :eyes:

Please, do I need to expand on how wrong you are?

Ban ban ban ban ban ban ban.

And people wonder why liberalism has the whiff of moralistic douchebaggery associated with it.

;-)

Same with Australia and New Zealand -- well behaved. The exception might be Mexico, where fans at Azteca Stadium almost always throw objects and bags of urine at U.S. players when the two teams square off.

So it's not the game itself. The problem is that Europe has developed a longstanding soccer hooligan culture, and let it fester for too long.

Tell me some more fairy tales.:evilgrin:

:D

They deal with it decisively and effectively. Any time you have an event of such scale there is potential for trouble. Of course .0001% causing trouble (among billions watching) somehow brings out lunatic statements like "banning soccer". By the way, as it's been pointed out, many hooligans are not fans, but are taken over by the crowd mentality and alcohol, which has nothing to do with the sport.

passion. We wouldn't want to go all violent and criminal, but both as a party and a people, we could surely use a little more fire in our bellies. America seems positively comatose when it comes to politics--despite the most outrageous behavior imaginable.

"Our Town"...
We seem like we're members of a small community that where everyone was taught that our small community couldn't exist properly without proper laws and honest leadership. We believed in the "Golden Rule" and thought that things like corruption, crime, violence and murder could never happen here. In fact, we believed we would never allow such things to happen here... but as we grew to adulthood, one of our leading citizens--actually, our mayor began committing violent crimes and stealing things... But then, the violence and murders were mostly in the next town over (and those people were relatively helpless), still, for whatever reason, we didn't react. The mayor just claims that it's a time of war, and, after all, it wasn't long ago that someone from that other town did blow up the local supermarket--killing several of our citizens! Though the supermarket afair was pretty suspicious... it even appeared the mayor might've had some buddies do it, but his pal the sheriff investigated and claimed it was somebody from the next town over--a really poor town filled with immigrants. Since then, the mayor has raised property and sales taxes through the roof while excluding his family and friends, created a special school for their kids while defunding the public schools, tapped everyone's phones, built a special jail where anybody he wants ends up without trial or even access to a lawyer. The town council does everything he says since his pals make up a majority there. They keep talking about building a crystal cathedral while crucifying the two gay guys in town--and won't let them marry. They want to change the town charter to exclude gays explicitly, but most of the townsfolk don't care much except for the principle of the thing and half the town agrees entirely. The mayor and town council have run up the town's debt so much while closing down good businesses that we're all beginning to suffer and expect things to get truly bad. They've revoked most of the laws regarding taking bribes, and have allowed the mayor to write his own laws and change existing ones--allowing him almost dictatorial powers. Still, most folks are scared of those immigrants and want to build walls and spend money buying guns and equipment for the mayor, his buddies and the Sheriff. As it is, the mayor got the contract to rebuild the supermarket and his gun and security store has been chosen as supplier for all the new helicopters, 4x4 armored trucks, machine guns and other weapons to protect us. The mayor and his friends amount to almost half the town, but not quite--and many of them aren't really friends but rather friendly acquaintences. The funny thing is that even among them, only the friends are benefitting, the acquaintences are being screwed just like the rest of us. Of course, the mayor's office runs the elections... everything from collecting the votes to counting them to announcing the results. Heck, it's his newspaper, radio and TV station that we get all our information about the world from. But we figure, surely, they wouldn't cheat on the elections!?! It did seem strange how he got elected over a more popular fellow and then won reelection despite the polls saying he was behind--and that people weren't happy with all the cost of trashing the other towns. In fact, though, lately more and more people are beginning to realize that he's lied to us and has been screwing us royally... Many people knew this all along but were laughed at. The thing is, nobody, even those most outraged have done anything but quietly complain when they're near others they trust. No matter how unbelievable what the mayor does is, nobody even protests. We all know that murder, cheating, stealing, violence, debt, mayors that are above the law and the adulteration of our laws is destroying our once peaceful, respectable little town. We know it, but we're in some sort of apathetic coma. Nobody's willing to put down the TV remote or forego a beer to organize a resistance. Many are scared, many more have their heads in the sand and intentionally or unintentionally don't have a clue what's going on. Our young people never learned about how a town should be run; if the mayor and his pals who own all the businesses in town and who live in mansions aren't stopped, we'll all be nothing more than their slaves, begging for a handout or a low wage job. What's the world coming to? Why don't we take back our town? Why don't we at least make sure the votes are taken and counted properly. What is wrong with us?

Then one day, we saw some people getting rowdy in public on tv--actually taking the risk of getting arrested over something as insignificant as sports! We all just realized... while we didn't want to resort to violence, the least we could do is take the risk of all getting together and making plans to take back our town! Our first order of business was to have some ballots printed up as part of the plan to reject the mayor's electronic voting machines--so we'd know for sure if we failed to elect our choice for mayor! We face an election in a few months and we've all agreed not to listen to the lies that will no doubt be put on/in the mayor's tv/radio/newspaper and to make our own printed newsletter for sharing the real news! We're not feeling afraid anymore; our depression and stress have lifted--now that we're actually taking action and doing something to bring back the good old days!

Hooligans see their clashes as a sport in its own right. They meet near soccer games, but it has not really anything to do with the game itself.

As to linking racism and violence: that's simply Bullshit. There is not more of either at soccer matches than anywhere else. Solutions are not that simple.

Heck, by your logic the US must be a soccer-crazy country - just look at the violent crime nubers.

they were going to stir shit up--losing at the last minute to the hated Germans didn't help, either

Gernman kids put some policeman in the hospital. I don't recall any such incidents in 94 (USA) Italy (90) and Japan Korea (02) I was too young to follow earlier cups. It's just the racist euro-trash element doing what they've always done. Soccer is their venue because of the national pride that's involved. If everyone played cricket and there was a true world cup in that sport, they'd do it there too. But few play that game.

It has been great for him. He's become more confident and is in great shape. I look forward to his games (Under-8 division) more than I do any other sporting event. Parents and coaches are (almost always) well-behaved and respectful of the other teams, even when the game is a complete blowout.

Your dislike of soccer doesn't mean that it should be banned. By your logic, most college and professional sports should have been banned years ago. Surely if they had been, we would all be sitting around singing "Kumbaya" by now. :eyes:

Ban Baseball. How many times has a baseball bat been used in riots?
It's almost sad how obsessive some people are about a sport they don't even care about. Nor do they get it. They only wait for the bad news to happen to have a great day. Or is it jealousy because football is so much bigger than their preferred sport?

Well, I'm looking forward to enjoy the next match while some deplorable people can go on obsessing about sports they don't like.

and I am a Steelers fan.

I plan on taking in a few Riverhounds games as a result.

You must be a good athlete to play soccer, fast on your feet and physically fit.

I think it is very similar in action to basketball..but yet better.

here in the US...

once at a "thermos night" give away for a Pens game...the fans started beating each other with the thermoses...(spelling???)

i actually remember when it happened. same thing happens every time the pirates give away the mini baseball bats.

I'm a Yankees fan though. I saw a few games at Three Rivers when I was a kid, though.

To me, Soccer is the most exciting sport to watch...and much more exciting than American football. It takes incredible athleticism and talent, and the fast pace makes it fun to watch. :)

I haven't gotten to watch much after vacation but it was great!!

In US pro football there are some great athletes, but there are also some guys who are lucky that a lot of running isn't required because they would kill over of a heart attack..that or they would slim down.

As for soccer...the players are like gazelles..and some of the kicks...one match I saw a goalie kick the ball almost to the other goal...

remember what they used to do in europe? do you really think soccer is the cause of european strife? is this "banned" idiocy supposed to be a joke?

n/t

and add just about any other public event and you've got trouble.

Lets ban men, flags, face paint and green spaces.

Lets arrest all people dressed similiar.

Lets ban moms. Provenfact, if there were no mothers, we'd have no hooligans. And no cancer, war, or mean people.

They KILL refs in some countries. Don't know what it is about soccer.

This statement is very disappointing, especially here on DU.

One thing you do not understand is that German Polizei do not wait for trouble to start, they start busting heads when they see a situation occur that could lead to trouble and they are very well trained at handling these types of situations. Unlike US law enforcement, whose hands are sometimes tied by the constitution and other laws, they make a very serious effort at prevention and being proactive, not reactive. I am not criticizing US law enforcement, as I realize our laws and expectations are different in the US. I am just emphasizing a difference in our two countries, so that everyone may better understand what occurred yesterday.

I live in a small town in Germany and they have big screen TV's set up in our village for fans to watch the games. There are always at least 6 to 10 Polizei in this area as a preventative measure. We have had this area set-up for a week now with no problems, partially because the German Government is saying that violence of any kind will not be tolerated.

I suggest you re-read the news article. I did not see anywhere within that article that any fans went to the hospital or were treated for injuries. The polizei saw a dangerous situation develop and rather than wait until they needed ambulances, they nipped it in the bud before it could get out of control. Barney Fife would be proud! :)

It's more frightening, and harder to control, when the violence erupts within a stadium, and people
are trapped.

I think undoubtedly there is some nationalism at work - Poland/Germany, England/Germany, for
starters, and probably other ethnic tensions surfacing as well with different groups.

Soccer was slow to take off amongst the Anglo-Australian community for this reason - in Sydney, all
the local teams had European names like Hakoah, Apia, etc., and it wasn't unusual for ethnic
rivalries to erupt on the field as well as off. So Anglos tended to avoid local matches, and stuck
to Rugby (which bores me silly), but in time the ethnic team names were dropped, and the game became
more popular outside the European migrant community. It's now becoming more popular in this country
than either Rugby League or Rugby Union (which has always had a smaller following), or even Aussie
Rules.

:hi:

on TV, and there were no "hooligans" after the game, just people out with flags celebrating in good fashion.

Soccer will never be banned in Europe, it's part of the culture, and it's a stupid comment to even suggest it.

saying in a proclamation: "For as much as there is a great noise in the city caused by hustling over
large balls, from which many evils may arise, which God forbid, we command and forbid on behalf of
the King, on pain of imprisonment, such game to be used in the city in future."

Henry IV, Henry VIII also passed laws against it, and Elizabeth I had soccer players jailed for a
week, with follow up church penance.


http://athleticscholarships.net/history-of-soccer.htm


Guess it didn't work then, and wouldn't work now.

Whenever you get many thousands of people meeting you will always get isolated thuggery and violence
This World cup has been very peaceful compared with Football competitions in the past.
Most of the news organisations in Europe have hardly covered the violence mentioned on this board
because it is insignificant.

Around 40k people there. No violence, no attacking of folks wearing Astros colors. I guess baseball fans know how to behave compared to savage soccer fans. Also a bunch of folks were at Winged Foot yesterday. I didn't hear anything about mass attacks or mass arrests.

Yesterday there was the Sweden vs Trinidad and Tobago match here. 80,000 in the stadium, several times that number outside. Trouble? zero.
That's more or less the story for for all matches so far, even the Dortmund incident ended without serious injuries.
In fact there is less violence happening right now than in normal summers, according to the official numbers.

There are over a million visitors in Germany right now from every country on the planet. All hoping their favorite team wins the world championship.........A REAL WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP btw.... Just a tad different than 40,000 bored Cubs fans early in the season with no pennant race in sight.:eyes:

Oh and there wasn't any violence to speak of yesterday at the World Cup....spread out over about a dozen cities........but then you don't want to talk about that now do you? :eyes:

It appears he loves to google past episodes of violence to try and further his cause of banning soccer. I'm beginning to think he was always the last one picked at dodgeball during recess.:eyes:

Yeah, ban football. See how that works out.

% Lenny punches Principal Skinner in the stomach, knocking him into the
% aisle stairway. He collides with Barney's beer tray, spilling it. Barney,
% enraged, runs headfirst into the increasingly large number of people
% fighting on the stairs, bowling them over. Meanwhile, a group of Scottish
% men watching the game stare boredly at nothing in particular.

Ach! They call this a soccer riot? Come on, boys, let's take 'em to school!
-- Groundskeeper Willie to his fellow scots, "The Cartridge Family"
http://www.snpp.com/episodes/5F01

The comparison between the two announcers. :D Only American announcers make soccer boring.

;)

and act up to have any kind of excitement. I have again attempted to watch some of this crap and it always confirms my earlier beliefs. It's just a boring game with very little excitement and dudes pretending to be hurt all the time. It's so bad that I'd rather watch curling.

Doesn't matter if goals aren't scored, if the ball is moving fast and
you're seeing good teamwork, it's great to watch.

Only gets boring when the players aren't really good, even if they're
scoring goals. A good match shouldn't really have a high score, because
that means at least one goalkeeper isn't doing his job.

But calling it boring while not understanding it is ignorant. There is no constant stoppage (check baseball and americal football), the game is fast and non-stop action, relatively infrequently culminating in a goal, which adds more excitement. Plus it's an undisputed world's game, where countries from every corner of the world vie for two years for the honor to be represented in a month-long celebration of the sport and unity, occuring every 4 years.

You're in a clear minority.

At least no one has declared war (yet).