Soccer Preview

T-minus 2 days until Direct TV's free soccer preview. Lookin' forward to it. Ha ha. Ha. I am getting better about all the soccer.

*Clears throat*

I know we hate Chelsea.

We usually like a team playing in a red uniform. This sounds like a girl opinion but that is straight out of the mouth of my husband who doesn't ever seem to really root for anyone. No, no. We watch soccer for the sport of it.

*Mimes shooting self in head*

Back to how I'm totally into soccer now.

I enjoy the announcers. In the beginning, I couldn't understand like 85% of what they said, and now I can. So it's like I have finally learned a second language. I wish that counted. Not only made me bilingual but as a bonus, uber-cultured.

*Sips from imaginary teacup with pinky extended*

I love the voices of Ian Darke and Steve McManaman (or McMan-a-man-a-man-a-man-a-man-a-man, as I like to call him, which drives the hubby crazy). They're comforting in the same way I used to find Hawk and DJ's voices comforting. I always said if I was ever in a coma, please put on the White Sox. There was just something soothing about the way they covered the game. Spend however many years watching the White Sox with my grandmother and father and it's inevitable. I don't know why, but I loved how whether we were terrible or amazing, their voices remained beyond calm and relaxed. They were practically asleep. Even excitement was low key.

Can of corn!

Anyway, soccer's not just a game where something almost happens for 90+ minutes. Although I do enjoy responding to my husband's guttural sounds and exclamations, fist pumps and jumps up from the couch by saying, "Wow! Something almost just happened there!" Then I go back to my book or whatever, chuckling to myself while avoiding his death gaze. Oooooooo, oooooooo. But it's still 0-0 and we end the game there. I'm too American to really enjoy a sport where it feels like 100% of the time, the game ends TIED. How sporty can a sport be WHERE NO ONE WINS?

I just, I can't, I, oh my God...

Sorry, I started to hyperventilate a minute there.

I just googled Barclays (aka English) soccer highlights from last year and this came up. I was going to prove things happen in soccer. I made it 2 minutes in before I couldn't take it anymore. Wow. Look at the slow motion clapping. And running. Sort of. So, essentially, nothing even happens in the highlights? I am failing right now. Bollocks! Let's show highlights of lots of looking at one another, angsty angsty. It's Twilight for men, I guess. See me looking at you, you looking at me, clap clap, shake our heads, let's embrace, then let's look around at each other some more. Coach to coach, player to player, player to coach, coach to player. So much angst!

I have seen some impressive soccer plays. I am not going to deny that. My husband will rewind and replay them for me, so yes, I have seen them. They exist. Sometimes even the really terrible plays are great, like when someone scores in their own goal or when someone acts like they've been severely injured and the replay shows no one touched them. Some of those guys could win Oscars. Those are pretty fun. Unfortunately, the moments of excitement are few and far between, and the ad before the boring highlight real was for The Hunger Games, so at least that was worth my time and energy.

SO. EXCITED.

Back to soccer.

I have now freely admitted that things actually happen in soccer. I mean, it's possible. My husband watched a soccer game the other weekend before I woke up and he saved it on the DVR for me.

Hooray.

I had to admit, though, it was entertaining, the little bit he wanted me to see.

Ian and Steve narrate this lovely little moment where there is an extra player on the field.

Finally, a soccer player that I can recognize. I have a lot of difficulty telling one player from another even when we watch the same team play a bunch of times. Those soccer players, they all look the same. Which I think somehow makes me racist against white people, and that makes my head hurt. I like the goalie from Everton because he's American and he has a shaved head so I can recognize him. I also like the goalie from Arsenal because he's strange looking so I can also recognize him. I also like saying Arsenal. Because it has arse in it, you wankers. Maybe I like those 2 goalies because it also helps me recognize a player when he has to stand all alone on his side of the field for the whole game. Maybe that's it. Yeah, yeah. I know, I know. I'm such an authority. Blimey! I'm going to go have my coffee now.