Amen to Rugby...now that is a sport to watch!

America has a man's sport to watch:
http://www.ratcityrollergirls.com/

Would we still be able to use steriods in either Cricket or Rugby? If so, America will be all over it! (And we need to be able to beat the shit out of our wives, girlfriends and whores as well) Then it would be really american!!

Seriously, cricket? I'm no big fan of baseball, but cricket? Charles, you've said made a lot of unfounded arguments, but this is rediculous. I don't think I'll ever be able to take you seriously again.

We need a better form of Chaz (Dead Chaz)

Hahahah! Charles, what the fuck would you know about a sport for real men?

Bowling! Bowling is the American sport of the future.

The third option is that it doesn't generate significant interest in the short OR long term... I'm going with that one.

After cricket maybe we can have competitive croquette.

please stop the myths of the noble europeans.

Yep, soccer, english futbol a real gentleman’s sport. In Europe, the fans of the big firms, throw bananas at players of African descent, they do furious monkey chants everytime a black player touches a ball, Domestic violence sky rockets through out the world during the world cup, stabbings, shootings. El Salvador and Honduras went to war over a soccer game. In Rome Lazio fascist supporters are given a whole section of a stadium to put up flags and do nazi salutes. Some of their players return the salute. Paramilitaries in Scotland go out and shoot catholic Celtic fans, In Belgrade former death squad members and war crime fugitives form supporter clubs for The Belgrade Red Star which was owned by a notorious Serbian war criminal. For a taste of how gentle the Brit fans are read Among the Thugs.

Fuck rugby. The sport of the south African racists. Remember the All black team? And how it’s players were apartheid secret police?

PELE was great no one will ever be greater in this lifetime, to mention Beckham in the same sentence as PELE is a travesty. Beckam is nothing but an overrated striker. Pele was 106 years old when he came to the US and still the COSMOS had a marvelous year. They actually ignited a little spark back then. There is a great documentary on it. Beckham will do nothing of the sort.

Futbol ( Soccer) will never catch on in this country because it is the sport of the middle class, it is not the sport that poor kids play. When athletes of the Allen Iverson caliber start playing futbol that’s when futbol will catch on here. When the inner city dusty fields are filled with poor kids of all colors playing futbol than that’s when it will be big here. Just like it is in Sur America.

Crickett has nothing on baseball. That’s just that over placed love for the Brits.

ICHIRO WAS MVP!! MVP baby!! You can beat the crap out of anybody with a baseball bat.

When Charles denigrates baseball in favor of cricket, he's just betraying his sentimentality towards British colonialism.

Dang, and I was all like, "Charles is posting about SPORTS??? WTF?" And even stranger, I was right there with you -

- until that last stupid paragraph.

We have plenty of "gentlemen's sports" in this country: golf, tennis, polo, yacht racing, et al. As for "real men's sports", well, I'll grant you American football doesn't even compare to rugby, if that's your particular definition of "manly sporting". But, if we're going to go down that road, I'd suggest that ice hockey is probably much more inherently violent than rugby, blow-for-blow, and probably on a par with boxing or Irish Hurling for sheer blood-spurting, bone-shattering "manliness".

And before we get into the whole "oh, but that's not what REAL sport is all about," let me just follow Charles' normal style-sheet with a quote from George Orwell: "Serious sport has nothing to do with fair play. It is bound up with hatred, jealousy, boastfulness, disregard of all rules and sadistic pleasure in witnessing violence: in other words it is war minus the shooting."

Rugby, okay, is pretty cool (but so is American Football).

But Cricket is, without a doubt, the most boring, inscrutable sport ever dreamed up by man. The games take 5 days-- that's right, 5 days! And those white sweaters make you look like a sissy! It's about as much a sport for real men as synchronized swimming or a quilting bee. No, Cricket will not do.

Charles reminds me of the Operative in Serenity.

Oh yes, what the world needs now is 19th century Victorian values! Did you know, Charles, that cricket was quite popular in the USA until around 100 years ago? The snobby English wouldn’t invite the USA to their world championship games—only countries who hadn’t left their empire were invited. Its popularity soon evaporated here.

Talk about boring—the purists went beserk over the recent Cricket World Cup because it was “Americanized”—i.e. the games only took one whole day to finish!

Seme, good analysis about the class problem of USA soccer, but there’s more to it than that. The real problem is the USA soccer establishment has done a poor job of reaching out to the Latino community, which is already soccer-crazy. That’s where the action in the USA is, and where the creative players so lacking in the USA senior team are at.

However, the USA U-20 team currently playing in the U-20 World Cup in Canada has been a revelation—they beat Brazil, and it wasn’t a fluke. The whole team is way more skillful than the older guys, they’re really starting to get it (and yes, some of the best players are black). The English bookies list them at 8-1 to win the tournament, behind only Argentina, Mexico and Spain. And ahead of Brazil.

Larry Bird and Magic were rookies out of college. The impact of a declining soccer veteran from Europe just won't be the same.

Rugby, yes, the US fans would probably take to it... but cricket is even slower and more boring than baseball. Stop for tea, really?

@10 -- What absolute twaddle.

"Yep, soccer, english futbol a real gentleman’s sport." -- Charles was talking about cricket when he referred to a sport for gentlemen.

"Fuck rugby. The sport of the south African racists. Remember the All black team? And how it’s players were apartheid secret police?" -- The All Blacks are from New Zealand.

As for the rest of you... Cricket is actually the fastest-growing sport in the USA right now. Granted that's because it's really fucking small, but hey, it's getting somewhere. As to where you've got the idea that people objected to this year's world cup because it was one-day cricket (and hence american) I have no idea. The English play more one-day cricket than any other nation on earth, and it's been around for years; also, it's the only format in which there has ever been a world cup.

Anyway. Rant over. Carry on.

Holy fuck. Cricket? I tried to watch that swill when I lived in Australia. Multiple-day "tests," tea breaks, sweaters, and slacks.... ZZZZZZZZZZ. Lawn bowling has more action, while preserving cricket's uniform.

Rugby, on the other hand, is great. Though, it's not a replacement for American football. It's an alternative or a supplement.

In England, interestingly, both cricket and rugby are posh sports, while football is working class. It would seem strange until you remember that historically the English upper classes were larger and stronger than the poor, due to better food and living conditions. It's hard to reconcile our image of English upper crust manhood (Prince Charles) with the atavistic English upper class self-image ("the battle of Waterloo was won on the fields of Eton"). But the stereotype pops up as recently as Martin Amis's 1990 novel "London Fields," where posh Guy Clinch makes short work of working class tough Keith Talent during their anticlimactic fight.

@ sEB fLYTE

My mistake , I mean the spingboks who were apartheid cops. They do play in the same league as the All blacks from Kiwi land. Hey at one point when they invaded Africa they were all Rhodesians, but oh well.

The gentlemans sport comment was directed at 2 who was implying in his comment that only American sports fans become violent. There is nothing more racist and violent than a European soccer stadium. European Whites aren’t moved by the monkey chants and the banana throwing because it doesn’t affect them. The US is fucked up in some ways, but you will never, EVER see anybody here throwing bananas at a black or brown player and doing monkey chants. In Europe, whole stadiums do it. Thousands of people and most of the public doesnt seem to care.

@bb

I don’t know if outreach will change what sport becomes a country’s passion. Baseball became popular in Cuba, japan, Nicaragua, Domincan Republic, because of the invasions by the US Marines. Football( soccer) is popular in countries where the brits and limeys imposed it. Just like cricket in India and Pakistan. Rugby was obviously brought to the Islands and southern Africa by the colonializers.

Soccer can not have that impact here, no matter who you bring over. Even if you brought Ronaldinho, who is 10 thousand times better than that bore Beckham, Soccer would not catch on here. The premiere athletes in other countries dream of soccer players, here they dream of becoming Allen Iverson, poor white kids dream of baseball. Immigrants eventually adapt and become passionate about the sports of their home country. In the beginning there are passions for the home country sport and you can sport the Guadalajara Chivas shirts but your kids here will sport the Oakland Raider Jerseys.

"real gentlemen and a sport for real men"
Why do you say crap like this.
Women play sports too.
And if there ever was a better football than American/Canadian football then it would be a game actually played with the feet, and that is football (Soccer to a few in the world)
But then there is a major point you are missing right now and that is Beckham's move to LA coincides well with the FIFA U 20 (under 20) games being played to sellout crowds all across Canada. Yes you too could be watching some of the best Football around right now in Burnaby a suburb of Vancouver in Canada. The momentum generated from these games is quite good and it is a big mistake for the US sports media to typically not report too much on it. By the way as already mentioned the US is doing quite well. The players involved in these games right now will be the future of international football.
Once the focus is on US football with the help of Mr. Beckham then all will fall into place with better coverage of international games.
After all we are talking about the most popular sport in the world.

I thought Kickboxing was the sport of the future.

@10, 20 - Quit with the sweeping generalisations.


Are you taking the ridiculous position that the US shouldn't play rugby because South Africa used to have apartheid? Presumably you don't take the bus either, 'cos there used to be segregation.


And while we're at it, your assertion that all European Soccer Stadia are full of racist thugs is just as bad. There have been isolated incidents recently, which UEFA has acted upon, but you seem to think no progress has been made since the 70s and 80s.


Football is popular everywhere in world, not just where Brits introduced it. (I don't think impose is the right word!) The key to it's success is that is that it is easy to pick up, and you can play it with no equipment - just use a discarded soda can for the ball.


I am finally going to agree with SeMe now... Whether soccer ever gets big in the US is another matter - the best athletes get picked off for the football / basketball / baseball teams - where the big money is. That means there'll be very little chance of a home-grown mega-star, which means it'll never really capture the public's imagination, so it'll never have the big money.. Catch-22 anyone? You already have too many sports... Arena Football gets as much coverage as soccer, it seems!


As for cricket - it's great! The newest 20-over form (Twenty20) is quicker than a baseball game, and has become very popular (i.e. people actually are turning up to matches). Don't knock it until you're actually tried it.

@10, 20 - Quit with the sweeping generalisations.


Are you taking the ridiculous position that the US shouldn't play rugby because South Africa used to have apartheid? Presumably you don't take the bus either, 'cos there used to be segregation.


And while we're at it, your assertion that all European Soccer Stadia are full of racist thugs is just as bad. There have been isolated incidents recently, which UEFA has acted upon, but you seem to think no progress has been made since the 70s and 80s.


Football is popular everywhere in world, not just where Brits introduced it. (I don't think impose is the right word!) The key to it's success is that is that it is easy to pick up, and you can play it with no equipment - just use a discarded soda can for the ball.


I am finally going to agree with SeMe now... Whether soccer ever gets big in the US is another matter - the best athletes get picked off for the football / basketball / baseball teams - where the big money is. That means there'll be very little chance of a home-grown mega-star, which means it'll never really capture the public's imagination, so it'll never have the big money.. Catch-22 anyone? You already have too many sports... Arena Football gets as much coverage as soccer, it seems!


As for cricket - it's great! The newest 20-over form (Twenty20) is quicker than a baseball game, and has become very popular (i.e. people actually are turning up to matches). Don't knock it until you're actually tried it.

And while we're at it, your assertion that all European Soccer Stadia are full of racist thugs is just as bad. There have been isolated incidents recently, which UEFA has acted upon, but you seem to think no progress has been made since the 70s and 80s.

Wrong, wrong, wrong and allow me to say that is just bull crap. The clubs quietly support the thugs. It is their base. Give me a break. Saw it with my own eyes at a Lazio match in Rome. Saw it with my own eyes at a Rangers-Celtic match in Glasgow. Where UDA types roam the streets before the match trying to stab catholics or foreigners. The banana throwing, the gorilla chants is still going on and it is not an isolated incident. It is thousands of people in the stadium doing it. Real Sports did a documentary about it. Henri the French Player has spoken about how bad the problem of racism in soccer stadiums is. Belgrade's Red Star is full of paramilitaries and it is by far an isolated incident. You can see whole sections of stadiums in Spain doing Nazi salutes. Wake up.

I never said that rugby shouldnt be played, they can try to play it, it wont catch on, I was just trying to point to the myth that they are so pure in europe and theyre so violent here.

For the record I love FUTBOL ( not as much as baseball and b-ball). I just dont think it has a future here.

Re supporting thugs, Italy just introduced laws to stop clubs paying off their "supporters" clubs, I believe.

I'm not too sure where you thought that this was a discussion of the purity of Europe compared to the US. And why you thought there was a myth - I'm fairly sure most Americans associate European soccer with hooliganism. All I was saying is that it's not as bad as it was.

All Charles said was that the US needed better versions of the sports. I read "more entertaining / interesting".

This http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/sport/2007/07/11/boom_boom_fan_culture_is_dead.html is an interesting comment on that view.

What about Ultimate Frisbee, Charles?

It only takes a few hours, then you go drink beers together afterwards.