After the Buccaneer defense completed a 48-21 shellacking of the big, bad Oakland Raiders, I slumped sheepishly back into my seat and felt the empty post-January lull of American sports. I could not let this dead period harsh my mellow – I was determined to find a remedy.
I’m not the most avid NFL fan, but it passes the time until baseball season. In preparation of this respite and its melancholy influence on the sporting soul, I decided to find a suitable replacement to the unspectacular middle months of the NHL and NBA seasons. In my time away from Oberlin College, I found my muse – the cure for the post-Super Bowl blues.
First, let me say – at the risk of sounding elitist – that Ohio is limited when it comes to expanding one’s international sporting appetite. While toiling in relative obscurity in New York, I stumbled across Fox Sports World, a revelation in digital television technology. Instantaneously, I was smitten with European football (soccer to us lowbrow Yanks) or footie, as the Brits call it.
Until that point, my football knowledge was limited to last year’s World Cup and David Beckham – the most recognizable international sports icon outside of the good ol’ US of A. Married to Posh Spice (remember them?) a.k.a. Victoria Fuller, Becks (as the London tabloids dubbed him) also plays for the most popular club in the world, Manchester United. A quick sidebar: to further mythologize the deity that is David Beckham, he and Posh decided to name their two children, both boys, Romeo and Brooklyn.
In short, I was hooked. You want dedication? How about waking up at 7:30 a.m. just to watch a Manchester United-Arsenal showdown live? Soaking up as much information as I could, I soon expanded my fixation to the web, seeking out several websites to feed my insatiable hunger for all things football. Despite the fact that I am an outsider to the game – though an attentive sports fan nonetheless – additional wisdom called for prolonged hours in front of the tube and a Y2K (remember that?) supply of Guinness for full understanding and appreciation.
It did not take long. From the wry British wit of the play-by-play announcers to Beckham’s pinpoint crosses to the world-class finishing skills of Thierry Henry, I soon fostered an admiration for a sport completely outside my frame of reference and far removed from the candy-coated glorification the American media loves to heap on its athletes.
In this humble columnist’s opinion, the FA Barclaycard English Premier League is the most competitive of all the European leagues with kudos to Spain’s Primera Liga and Italy’s Serie A. Besides the Premiership title race between Arsenal and Manchester United there are intriguing competitions in Spain, Italy and Germany. Real Sociedad tops La Liga with uberclub Real Madrid (the richest club in the world) heating up in second. FC Barcelona, another giant, has slipped of late, dropping to the middle of the pack. In Italy, the traditionally strong clubs will battle for the Scudetto title to the bitter end. Longtime Milan rivals AC and Inter will attempt to stall Juventus of Turin and Lazio of Rome as the stretch run begins. Finally, in the Deutsche Bundesliga (sometimes more entertaining to say than to watch), perennial frontrunners Bayern Munich will attempt to avenge their premature exit from the UEFA Champions League by holding off rivals Borussia Dortmund.
Here is another reason to take in football: the Champions League Tournament. The best football clubs in Europe, in what amounts to the top four teams in every UEFA-sponsored nation, are drawn in World Cup-like groups. The difference is that each team plays the other three twice (home and away), receiving three points for a win, one for a draw and nil for a loss. The top two in each group advance to a second group stage and repeat the format culminating in a nail-biting knockout-style format akin to the NFL playoffs.
We are now in the second Group Phase as the much-heralded European Cup competition returned from its winter break this week. With crucial victories AC Milan, Manchester United and Barcelona each took commanding leads in their respective groups. Barcelona’s eleventh straight Champions League win breaks AC Milan’s glorious run of ten on the trot in the 1992-93 season. Group B is wide open after Arsenal’s home draw against Dutch powerhouse Ajax Amsterdam. Arsenal, Ajax and Valencia have all taken five points from the first three games with Arsenal ahead on goal difference. Favorites are Real Madrid who won a record ninth European Cup in 2002, AC Milan who have been in excellent form of late and Manchester United. Each team now has three group games remaining before the quarterfinal draw and knockout stage.
Finally, I urge anyone else interested in experiencing the international sport at its very best to tune in when Juventus of Turin host Manchester United next Tuesday afternoon. Both squads are loaded with international talent. If you won’t listen to me, then listen to the more than 80,000 screaming Bianconeri and Red Devils fanatics in Turin next week.