Blatter blather cannot cover up naked realities facing football

This is an extraordinary article that seems to conclude that for the sake of viewing figures if nothing else that in the heady world of soccer, if a final is played and the winning team isn't obvious then a naked penalty shoot out would be the answer. (I attach some pics to serve as an example of what we could expect.) Well call me gay, but hey that's real obvious! The article goes into the various arguments about penalty shoot outs and other related football stuff about which I know nothing. I don't watch sports to follow a team - I do it to lust over the boys thighs, which if shorts get any longer is going to be one of those joys that will have to be written off. I don't understand this thing for long shorts in sport they're just rubbish and get in the way. Just maybe some inspiration could prevail from the AFL teams. Or maybe as the article says, the guys could play naked....now here is the article.
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Paul Wilson
Sunday October 1, 2006
The Observer

Just imagine for a moment you are Sepp Blatter. Not the most thrilling of fantasies, I know, but put yourself in his place for a second or two.

The English Football Association would like your organisation to investigate the agent Pini Zahavi, some of your own officials have just been accused of corruption, court cases are being prepared to establish the principle that clubs should be paid for allowing national teams to use their players, money-laundering via football is becoming a serious world issue and the security problems surrounding the venue for your next World Cup are just not going away.

What do you do? Threaten to abolish the penalty shootout, that's what.

Apparently the Fifa president now thinks the manner in which Italy beat France was 'a tragedy', and not just because of Marco Materazzi's unfortunate remarks to Zinedine Zidane. Blatter believes penalties are a terrible way to settle the planet's biggest tournament and few would give him an argument there, though wait until you hear the possible alternatives.

'Maybe we could replay the match if it is the final,' Blatter said. 'You can't do that through the tournament because of lack of time, but the final is different.' Brilliant. Why didn't anyone think of that before? It's not as if anyone would mind hanging round

Berlin or somewhere for another three or four days, rebooking their hotel rooms and their flights home and paying out all over again for the tickets, is it? All those sponsors and supporters can't get enough of the World Cup, so they would jump at the chance to get two finals for the price of, er, two finals. And if they were really lucky the replay might end in a draw, too, so the whole process could go on indefinitely like Arsenal and Leeds in their four-match FA Cup tie in 1991.

'Or maybe,' Blatter continued, showing a certain lack of conviction in the earlier argument, 'we could take players away and play golden goal.' That wouldn't be tragic at all, of course. Imagine reaching a World Cup final, playing in a World Cup final, then being ordered to leave the field after 120 minutes while an eight-a-side game takes place to decide whether you receive a winner's medal or not. It would achieve a quick result, as would throwing on an extra ball, but no one ever considers that because it would be undignified and silly.

Everyone knows penalty shootouts have their faults. As Blatter says, they transform a team game into an individual event and,because going out on penalties is considered a more honourable defeat than losing in open play, there are grounds for suspecting that many teams settle for the shootout long before the end of a game. But they are not undignified or silly and at the moment they are the best solution anyone can come up with.

Finals, especially unrepeatable showpieces such as World Cup finals, are the very games that should be settled on the day. And they should be showpieces, too, not miniature or artificial contests demeaning to everything that has previously taken place.

Penalties are acceptable as a last resort. The real problem is that they are not being used in that way. Their presence makes it less likely that a result will be achieved in extra time. What is needed is something that will re-energise the added half-hour, make teams desperately inventive rather than cautiously passive, determined at all costs to prevent the game going to penalties.

The answer? Naked penalty shootouts. Even more of a TV attraction and guaranteed to produce a result inside two hours. Sepp must be slipping if he has never thought of that one, though perhaps he does have a few other things on his mind at the moment.







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