Being an American sports player and of course a viewer I have seen variety of shenanigans happen on and off the field. A lot of professional sporting events usually feature at least a few complete train wrecks once a season and rarely focus on anything positive. The World Cup this year is no exception, even as I sit here and watch the final match I’ve seen a few player collisions that don’t look accidental, especially Nigel De Jongs spiked foot to the chest of one of Spain’s players at the end of the first half. However, one thing did happen during the first half of this match that no one, even the sports pundits on tv, pointed out that I’d like to mention here. At one point, Spain forwards passed the ball back to their own goalie from their own offensive zone. The pass was a bad one and the goalie could barely get a finger on it before it got past him and out of bounds. Lucky for Spain their goalie didn’t pull an England, but what happened next was interesting. This error produced a corner kick for the Netherlands team, which they took…however they gave up the perfect setup by passing the ball in bounds to Spain’s Goalie. The announcer said something about being a good sport, as if it were no big deal, but I was in a state of shock. Here was the perfect scoring opportunity for the Dutch and an easy way to capitalize on a big mistake by Spain…but they chose not to. I’m still wondering if this was just a cocky move or if there is some unwritten rule in FIFA that teams follow when this happens. American sports teams would have never given up this kind of an opportunity in the final match of such an important game. I’d love some clarification on this matter, so please weigh in by leaving a comment.
The point I want to make here though is clear, sportsmanship seems at least to be a little more respected on the world stage than in our own national backyards. I find this to be tragic, and it leaves a bitter taste in my mouth when thinking about what our youth is exposed to in America. We as a nation need to start paying a bit more attention to the world stage in this matter.
