This Sunday is the World Cup Final; the last game in a month long tournament that has captivated nations around the globe and even, to the surprise of some, the United States. In hindsight, the domestic appeal of this year’s tournament shouldn’t be that shocking. After all, Americans love a good excuse to don the red, white, and blue and chant in the direction of other, inferior countries. More importantly, millions and millions of us fell in love with the tantalizing idea of taking afternoons off from work to watch sporting events on weekdays.
As an avid soccer fan, I’ve been slowly coming down off of my World Cup high. The first thing that killed my buzz was the elimination of the U.S. team at the hands of the Belgians. (Damn you, Belgium, and your delicious beer!) Then there was the slow transition from three matches a day to one every couple of days. This reduction of games led to me spending less time standing around the office TV and more time sitting at my desk. Lame.
But once this Sunday’s Final match between Germany and Argentina passes, I will lose the most enjoyable part of this 2014 World Cup: listening to my son berate the referees.
This year Jack (who’s 7 going on 17) has really gotten into soccer. After a couple of years of playing and watching matches with his old man on TV, he’s become quite fond of the Beautiful Game. He seems to grasp the rules of “football” and has even managed to pick up some its colorful vocabulary. (His mastery of the term “Own Goal” is outstanding.) But most of all, he’s learning that match officials are always wrong, every day, all the time, always.
Father and son… waiting for the refs to make a costly error in judgment.
Jack’s colors didn’t run during the World Cup and he was Team America through and through. But to keep himself interested during non-U.S.A matches (and he watched plenty of those as well) he would choose a side to route for. I wasn’t always sure why he threw his allegiance behind any given nation, but whoever he graced with his fandom always seemed to get the short end of the stick from the refs.
“How is that a foul?!” Jack bellowed with great conviction toward our television.
“What are you, blind?! How could you not see that?!” Jack yelled when a call was shamefully overlooked.
“Come on! That’s a penalty!” Jack exclaimed anytime someone fell down near the box.
“These referees should be beaten with a tire iron in a dark alley until every bone in their body is ground into dust!!!” Jack shouted vengefully when the officiating mistakes were too much to bare.
Okay. I made that last one up. But you get the idea.
While the blame game my son played could sometimes be a little much, it was ultimately great fun to see him so passionately immersed in the games. As a lifelong sports fan, it did my heart proud watching him verbally abuse the lackluster performance of match officials whose one simple job is the see every errant tackle and handball made by twenty-two of the best players in the world who happen to be also be running up and down a 110-yard field. I mean, who messes that up?
I can only hope he transfers this irrational hatred of refereeing to other sports. This fall I look forward to Sundays filled with animated pleas for refs to “open their eyes” and see the obvious pass interference calls they’ll miss. Followed by a winter where he excoriates “zebras” for unquestionably costing basketball teams game after game. Baseball umpires will probably be spared because he understands very little about our National Pastime.
I believe that we will… get screwed by the refs!
Some people will remember the 2014 World Cup in Brazil for the plucky Costa Rican team that defied the odds and made it out of the group stage, or Tim Howard’s record-setting performance in goal against Belgium, or Germany’s efficient annihilation of the Brazilian hosts in the semifinals. I’ll remember it for the passion my son displayed for the sport of soccer and the way he channeled that excitement into blaming the referees for everything.
Yelling at referees is the sound of my future. And my future sounds glorious.
Mr. Sunshine 