Thank God for the World Cup.

Let’s get the cliché out of the way. I DO remember England winning the World Cup. I was 6 years old, and my Father let me watch the game on a Saturday afternoon. He wasn’t a great Soccer fan, but realised the importance of the game in general, but especially for a boy of my age. For many quadrennial tournaments after that, the growing excitement game by game, round by round as our beloved ‘boys’ advanced to their usual quarter final exit always made me wonder what on earth was it like in 1966, when we hosted and won it all.

 In 1970, the West Germans were revenged with an extra time 3-2 win that just destroyed both my best friend and I when we inexplicably watched the entire game on a Saturday night live from Mexico. In the other two tournaments of that decade, we didn’t even qualify showing that the lazy, strike ridden workforce of other industries in pre-Thatcher days was mirrored by our national team. In Germany in 1974, Holland finally beat Brazil in a heart-stopping quarter final, before being stopped cold by a West German team in the final. Four years later, they once again failed at the final obstacle by an equally uninspiring Argentina in Buenos Aries. See? There was nothing wrong with winning at home – everyone did it. That was the Scottish decade, when the fiery blue shirts suddenly became British as a substitute for us at the World Cup.

 Even  when I outgrew everything I  the 80’s, I followed the World Cup: England robbed by a shaky tournament structure in Spain, when they never lost, but didn’t score enough to get to the semi-finals – Bloody Argentina! In 1986, the same country did for us in the quarter finals with two goals – one, the most sublime exhibition of solo skills I have ever seen, the other a blatant foul, that made us hate the Argies more than the Falkland conflict. Only my World travels, and the onset of my thirties quenched the fire for following the tourney in Italy and The States, but I still caught the semi final against Germany in a bar in Juneau Alaska, an watched the new English disease take root – the lack of penalty scoring. By 1998, I was back. Argentina again! This time we didn’t even reach the usual round-of-8. 2002, and Brazil did for us at the usual round in Japan. Four years ago, Portugal scored more than we did from the penalty spot in the quarters again.

 Now, here we are again. On public transit, the shirts of the nations surround me, and whispers of teams they were going to lose to are being passed around. For a country of immigrants, to still be able to support the flag is something like a guilty pleasure. Where and when else would I be able to pit a soccer shirt on for work and put these words into a sentence, and have it make sense: “ O.K. Boys – hammer three past Algeria”

 Eleven tournaments and counting, and another country that I’m a part of understand the significance of fleeting global competition and the hope of domination, even if they don’t get the game. A chance to get past the quarterfinals, and no Germany or Argentina in our way. Thank God it’s back.

Inside the Olympics: The Undesired Activity

In a recent post, I wrote about the amount of ‘boot-licking’ a host city has to do in order to continually keep the IOC on its side. From the original bid document, through to the tearful farewell and wrap-up in Spring 2010, this city has been hosed, charged, and demanded-to from these officials to the point where we are now unsure of who actually this month-long (don’t forget the Special Olympics) festival. O.K., it is the largest one of it’s kind on the planet and, if they intend to make money from it in the future, any host city should be ready to invest. However, when items dictated to by the organisers start to cross certain lines, is it not up to the city to hold up a hand and argue it’s corner? Two cases in point raised in the last month argue this.

Every Olympic host city also presents a Cultural Olympiad for the arts that shows the best of your city, country, and extends a hand to other Olympic country travelling exhibits and troupes. Imagine being a winter sports fan, and taking a week out of your life to go to a welcoming town in a different part of the World, see the World’s best athletes compete in your favourite sports, then spend the evenings taking in fabulous artistic and cultural artists. If I had the odd hundred grand sitting around, I’d do it! Well, in a recent guideline handed down, it appears that these artists must contract to perform without making negative comments or the like concerning Olympic sponsors and the IOC! For dancers and opera singers, this may be OK, but perhaps not for you if you are a comic, painter, or actor. These people see a different view of things as a perfect point worth bringing up, but if someone gets excited and ad lib something along these lines  in February or March 2010, their performance can be immediately stopped.

In a related issue, no negatives are allowed to be ‘presented in written form’ in public view. While designed to stop negative graffiti and posters in camera view of the globe’s TV viewers, this has been extended to the interior of businesses and residences! This means that if I have a “No to Visa” sentiment in an upstairs window of my house, a representative from my local city council (I live in a host suburb.), has the right to enter my house and take it down.

Now, in both of the above cases, we would have to be in an extreme situation for punitive measures, I understand this, but haven’t the IOC been told that this country has a Charter of Rights and Freedoms that guarantee free speech, and personal property rights? The IOC that aren’t putting these rules in place to protect itself – they are designed to keep negatives away from their sponsors. The largest global corporations on earth have the ability to order this, through the organisers. A soft drink company has the right to complain to an IOC rep, who will tell the local organiser, who will pass onto an elected local official to do the dirty.

I see the day when these games will only take place in totalitarian states – they may be used to taking orders blindly. How did Norway, Japan, and the US ever stand for this?

More on the torch relay to come – I have received a few enquiries about it – unless someone has a problem with that, and will block my internet link. Blogging may become an ‘undesired activity’ in Olympic cities.