7 Reasons To Watch Women's Football

i've always enjoyed the women's game. it's a damned shame the professional league in the states is still relatively new and this interest in the sport is only still developing. i decided then, as a tribute to the english team who agonisingly crashed out of euro 2005 to the norwegians yesterday, to write this entry. can you believe that they only needed to score one goal to go from last in the group to winners of the group?



1. more real
a well-known manager in the men's game once frustratingly said "i can't talk to them, who can talk to eleven millionaires?". bang on point he made. professionals are professionals -they get paid obscene money just to warm the bench if they're not playin. if you lose the champions league this year, there'll always be next season. the women's game however is littered with girls who ain't professionals. karen carney, england's 17-year-old upstart was revisin for her a-levels hours before she scored that baggio-type goal against finland the other day (this lass speaks like steven gerrard, plays like steven gerrard and even shares the shirt number, i realised). not every player is michelle akers. some of the players from the developin countries must be no more than workin-class factory helpers in the textile industry. a bit like redbridge and dagenham except they're women eh.

2. more emotion
it's no surprise then that the women's game is much feistier. non-professionals will tend to always take things personally. the intensity is just lovely to watch as long as it is refereed well. every women's match is like a men's cup final. they tackle as if they'd never play again. i remembered that there were many tough mamasitas in the brazillian 2003 wc team. they screamed portuguese profanities to the referee, the opposition, the crowd and even amongst themselves. there were always malice in the tackles. lotsa snarlin and scratchin. everthin is personal. this is how football should be played, to a certain extent. which men's game was that when the two teams played out the last 5 minutes without a single meaningful pass because they knew they qualified through news from the other ground? that was a farce. someone remind me -italy was in it, right? the commentator was disgusted.

3. more theatrics
a necessary corollary of bein more emotional is bein more theatrical. who can forget brandi chastain's sports bra goal celebration when she scored that winnin penalty in world cup 99? (by the way, guess what i stumbled upon -brandi chastain's blog! she's writin here about how ecstatic she was when youri djourkaeff asked her for a kickabout) anyway, back to the theatrics (not a sarcy dig) i'd like to say that seein unbridled passion is just terrific for anyone who's hardened by too much professional men's football on tv. the other day england played finland and they led 2-0 for most of the match until the finns equalised with only injury time to go. carney went berserk when she scored to win it and ran to the camera shoutin "fuckin hell! fuckin hell! take that! take that!". now that's what i call heart.

4. spectacular goals
there's a reason for this -women goalkeepers suck. without goin into all that men are from mars, women are from venus bollocks, i'd like to objectively assert that women do have a generally poorer spatial cognition compared to men. judgin distance is not somethin women are fantastic for. men probably do it better (read maps, throw darts etc) because of neanderthal requirements for successful huntin. anyway, women generally suck at judgin distance and therefore women goalies are significantly poorer than men goalies. result -spectacular goals! in any single international tournament involvin women you could see at least ten 30-yarders which make the keeper flap at it before sailin gloriously into goal. it doesn't need to be a pile-driver volley, it could just be a casual chip. gets them everytime. wotta goal!

5. errrr... the girls?
hey what can i say? for the wolf, football and girls on the same channel is a match made in heaven. most of the players in the ongoin euro2005 for example, are younger than 24. also, not all of them look butch. this is a common misconception. the swedish forward who put england out today is paris hilton with character and a ponytail. while everyone knows about mia hamm, i'm tellin you fellas, you should really check out some of the girls in the past world cup italian teams. in the current england squad, i'd recommend the 18-year-old alex scott to my mate bob who's a sucker for cute faces. i like big fleshy girls so i'll have to go with rachel unitt but only because faye white and kelly smith are less feminine than i'd appreciate.

6. the mad skills
perhaps this is goin to sound sexist no matter how i word it but women footballers make me feel ashamed of my own abilities in the game. god they are so good. in my own conceited pride, i'd allow a woman to be cleverer than me, richer than me, taller than me and just about anythin else but when a woman plays football better than me, i'd feel that i'm the most useless fuckwit in the world. i've had the privilege of watchin a few truly great players by any standards. here i'd single out mia hamm, brigitte prinz (current world player of the year), faye white (england captain and arsenal centre-back, compared to roy keane), kelly smith (think vieri with the dribblin skills of zidane) and that chinese striker which i forgot what her name was. i've had not seen that young french forward pichon yet nor that brazillian speed demon that's so famous. nic once told me that the most decorated women footballer in the world, michelle akers, stayed in malaysia for a bit. wished i met her. could've taught me a thing or two. like how to do that rachel yankey flick i saw today.

7. hey, it's football
if you're a true fan of the beautiful game, you'd appreciate it at every level. besides, it gives me an excuse to write this;


rachel, queen of england
braver than the lion on your chest
rachel, pride of everton
we all admit that you're the best
with a left foot made in heaven,
and a smile that brightens up my world,
you're the england number three,
number one to you and me,
you're the one and only rachel girl
rachel!

(sung to the tune of Psycho -a tribute to nottingham and england's number 3 leftback)

ciao.

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Word Of The Wolf today is artifice \AR-tuh-fis\,

noun:
1. Cleverness, skill, ingenuity, inventiveness.
2. An artful trick or strategem.
3. Trickery, craftiness, insincere or deceptive behaviour.

"In those last seconds when every English pass found only Finnish feet, Karen Carney got the ball from 30 yards out and turned brilliantly away from a defender to feed Eniola Anuko who still missed but Carney was at hand with a piece of sublime artifice to chip home the rebound high into the net. The scoreboard read England 3 Finland 2."

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Artifice comes from artificium, from artifex, artific-, "artificer, craftsman," from Latin ars, art-, "art" + facere, "to make." It is related to artificial.