OT: why football is better than American football

[gravey101]

>You asked why soccer is being marketed to kids.

No, I didn't. I said that that is what I see most of them playing when I walk past playgorunds. You said, "They buy what is marketed to them".

My argument, which I support, is that soccer is not a big money sport today because the middle-age folk of today (i.e. those with the money) never played when they were kids. I believe that will change when todays kids become tomorrows middle-age folk.

>And I would hope that you realize that this is just a debate, not a point of any real importance to the world. So my comments are intended to bait and solicit responses, not to cause any undue anger.

I'm not angry at all... Just replying to your comments and pointing out where I disagree. Of course, refraining from using phrases like 'Bullcrap' when someone disagrees with you will always helps to keep the tone civil.. know what I mean...

[ October 11, 2003, 04:12: Message edited by: gravey101 ]

[Thermodyne]

Originally posted by gravey101:
>You asked why soccer is being marketed to kids.

No, I didn't. I said that is what I see most of them playing when I walk past playgorunds. You said, "They buy what is marketed to them".

>And I would hope that you realize that this is just a debate, not a point of any real importance to the world. So my comments are intended to bait and solicit responses, not to cause any undue anger.

Of course. I'm not angry at all... Just replying to your comments and pointing out where I disagree.

Well, I can’t really say much about what you see; it’s not within the bounds of my experience. But here, kids are not allowed to play football in school until they get to high school. And then only in an organized, supervised situation. So the vast majority of schools have no football. There is some peewee and youth football, but prolly not as much as soccer. And there is a big push to restrict that to kids 13 and older. At the high schools, soccer is a poor step child when compared to football. Soccer games are not played in the lighted stadiums that are built for football. And while football squads run into the 100’s at many schools, you won’t find any varsity soccer programs anywhere near that large. I should note that during the 80’s there was a shortage of soccer fields, so the county tore out a large park of baseball fields and built a huge soccer compound. It was a “Political necessity” they said. It would “support itself” the politicians said. Now it sits largely unused, and costs 1.5 mil to support in this years budget. The soccer mom voting block is seldom mentioned these days. Of late, it is the cyclist voting block that gets all of the lip service. And now there is a shortage of ball diamonds, so they are talking about tearing out some of the soccer fields.

[gravey101]

Fair points. Of course I only see what is there today wrt younger kids (have only been in suburban US for 5 years). What did they play 20 years ago? I am curious. I agree with your comments about organized high school sports, but I suspect that is still being driven by the older generation, at least somewhat.

[ October 11, 2003, 04:22: Message edited by: gravey101 ]

[oleg]

Originally posted by minipol:
... And involving my country:
Belgium - Russia 4-3 WC 1986
Belgium was bigtime underdog in this tourney and they finished 4th.

I still full with rage about that game. Two clear offside goals and we were denied the deserved victory

We had arguably the best team in our history and to be so cruedly robed

Still, that game is worth remembering. Last World Cup Russia-Belgia game (we lost again ) was such a crap in comparison.

[oleg]

Thermo, all you are saying is that football is more popular and makes more profit in USA. That is all. USA is a VERY reach country. Of course a lot of mony involved. But it is still less than 5% of humanity. Here in UK, all premiership games are sold out. And it is 9 games every weekend for 10 months. Add here FA cup, european cups, national, etc. I would not be surprised if all together there are more people visit stadium than all NFL games. And UK is about California size. There is a LOT of money in world soccer. It is just more evenly distributed between thousands of professional teams instead of only 30.

You ask why no soccer on TV, but footbal ? I laugh on it. Every week there are 10 if not 100 times more people watching soccer on TV than football worldwide. World Cup audience is 20 times the Superbowl coverage. See, you need TWENTY "most important sport event ever" to equal just one soccer game

[deccan]

Originally posted by oleg:
You ask why no soccer on TV, but footbal ? I laugh on it. Every week there are 10 if not 100 times more people watching soccer on TV than football worldwide. World Cup audience is 20 times the Superbowl coverage. See, you need TWENTY "most important sport event ever" to equal just one soccer game

I think that this debate is really kind of stupid, liking sports is a subjective matter after all and I have no personal interest in sports whatsoever.

But I'd like to point out that I agree with oleg here. I'm from Malaysia and you have no idea how the masses of Malaysians follow English Premier League soccer, even though they have to stay up at ungodly hours (because of time zone differences) to do it.

And if you're wondering about the commercial dimension of it, Manchester United has official stores in Malaysia, Singapore etc. selling memorabilla for god's sake.

Edit: I forgot to mention one other thing. The ONLY reason why pay TV is profitable in Europe is soccer. 'Nuff said.

[ October 11, 2003, 09:36: Message edited by: deccan ]

[oleg]

Yes, it is a stupid debate, but why not have it, it is just for fun, right

For the record, I hate MU. I'm a Liverpool guy Otherwise I would alredy tell that in Last 10 years MU sell enough replica shirts to cloth the whole male population of US

---

Oh, sorry, my math mistake here. MU sell only 1.8M shirts per year only ($50-$70 each). Still impressive

[ October 11, 2003, 12:51: Message edited by: oleg ]