A good result

I got to watch England play soccer in a pub again today!

Now, it was a slightly different experience than the last time. That was in September, 2008, in the Gloucester Arms, in the Gloucester Road. For the duration of that match, I was standing in a crowd of English supporters (supplemented by myself and some of my sports class students)—and I mean a crowd, dense enough to make it hard to hang on to your beer.

Today, it was a much less hectic scene, and arriving at the establishment 45 minutes before game time got us a front row seat. (Unlike at the Gloucester Arms, when all the seats must have been taken long before then!)


However, the fact that an American food and beverage establishment, here in the heart of gridiron football territory, advertised World Cup broadcasts, offered game-drink-specials, and—eventually—drew a nice crowd, means that real football is a lot more popular here than it was even just a few years ago.

This wasn't just any England game, either, but the first time in 60 years that they'd played us—as in USA-us—in a World Cup match. (Readers of this blog might remember my report on the draw that set up this epic encounter.) An exciting, but also somewhat disorienting, situation for Anglophile soccer fans such as myself.

How to behave at such a match? I've never rooted against either of these teams! Normally, though, I do like to root for underdogs, which made it easier for me to acceptably patriotic and shout USA! USA! USA! with gusto. I want it recorded, however, that I did stand for both national anthems.

As it turned out, the game ended with a great result, from my point of view, at least. It was a draw. Both teams got a point to aid in qualifying for the knock-out stages, and hopefully both of them will get to keep playing far into the tournament. And then, who knows?! We might not have to wait 60 years for another re-match!

Divided loyalties

One of the most exciting days on the world's sports calendar passed with hardly a whisper here in the benighted USA [I must admit that, absent media prompting, I forgot the date ahead of time myself]. But the World Cup 2010 draw was made on Friday and I couldn't be more pleased with the results.

My two favorite teams—USA by reason of birth [not hope that they could actually do well in the tournament] and England [for obvious reasons]—are in the same group! I don't think this has happened since 1950, when the US stunned the football world by beating England 1-0 in group play. Since I have been following international football, certainly, the only times I've seen them play each other was in friendlies that don't count for anything but bragging rights.

Now they'll be meeting on the biggest stage. And it's the first game of the group, too! What fun!

But, who to root for? Of course, I can't root for my country to lose, but it would feel very strange to root against England*. A tie, at this point in the tournament, would be most acceptable. It wouldn't keep either team from advancing, at least we wouldn't know at the time that it wouldn't, and it would actually be a good result for the USA, playing powerhouse England evenly.

Further along the line, when places in the group are being determined, though, things might get sticky. What if, in order for the US to advance, England has to lose to one of the other Group C members? Or vice versa? Now that will give me problems.

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*Why the cross of St. George instead of the Union Jack, you might ask? I'm so glad you did because it's one of my favorite examples of sports geography trivia.

In the top-level football world, there is no United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, rather separate "countries" of England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. This arrangement, which gives the UK as a whole a great deal more power within soccer politics than it would as a single country, is considered to be, I assume, a reward for having invented the sport in the first place and for having spread it all around the world with its once quite-extensive empire.

There are periodically discussions about fielding an all-UK team, for example in the Olympics, but the entrenched power of the individual FA's (Football Associations) for these separate "countries" would never allow consolidation on the level of "real" football. Besides, I think it's kind of cool.