The Dawn of the Integral Age

Soccer is entertaining 2010-May-18 at 02:06 PDT

No… not for the actual play.  That’s dreadfully boring.  Seriously.  Rest of the world: get a real sport, one that has actual strategy in it.  If you’re not familiar with what strategy looks like, check out baseball or American football sometime.

Christ, there’s more strategy in NASCAR than soccer.

No, “football” is entertaining simply for the sheer number of incidents of cheating and match-fixing and bribery found all over the world lately.  The latest?  It’s a good one.  Go grab some popcorn, I’ll wait….

From Lord Triesman’s 2018 bid claims face Fifa review, 17-May-2010:

World governing body Fifa is to probe ex-Football Association chairman Lord Triesman’s "bribery" comments over the bidding process for the 2018 World Cup.

Triesman was caught up in a tabloid sting suggesting Spain could drop its bid if rival bidder Russia helped bribe referees at this summer’s World Cup.

…

Triesman was secretly recorded allegedly divulging sensitive information to a former aide, including a claim that Spain and Russia, rival bidders for the 2018 World Cup, were conspiring to bribe referees at next month’s finals in South Africa as part of efforts to win the right to host the tournament.

Man, that’s fun.  I mean, it sucks for Lord Triesman… he’s getting pilloried for telling the truth, but the very fact that he said this in polite conversation means that it’s probably true, and that’s awesome.

I mean, what do we have over here, some guys taking steroids?  Really?  All the serious corruption is out of the major American sports… we’re just down to arguing over whether an umpire has a too-wide strike zone.

Corruption on an international level in the biggest sport in the world.  Stay classy, Soccer.