Game Day! Woo!

This is a big day.  My favorite team plays a team I seriously dislike. Unfortunately, this is where the Ails come in for "Football and Ail."  I'm a Notre Dame fan and today we play the Golden Eagles of Boston College, who always seem to beat us when we are on top of our game. Even though I wouldn't call this season a success so far, I'm still not looking forward to this match.  Of all the fan bases that I've met, BC wins for rudest, and that includes Michigan fans throwing eggs at my friends when they were visiting Ann Arbor and Tennessee fans who basically blind you with their colors.

EPL notes:

Manchester United's dressing room was flooded before their visit to Sunderland. It delayed the game by 20 minutes and won Sunderland my respect for their dirty tactics. Rooney isn't playing (not that he contributes that much when he does), which means Man United gets to start a lot of people that no one has on their fantasy team (30-year-old Michael Owen is only owned by 1.5% of all teams).

Blackpool is the blue-collared Cinderella story of the season, and this Cinderella has a potty-mouth. Blackpool is unique in many ways; they are the only team owned by a convicted rapist. This is their first season in the Premier League and everyone expects them to be relegated right back down to the second tier at the end of the season. Regardless of expectations, the Tangerines seem to be holding their own and make a decent underdog to root for against Liverpool.

I've been taking a shine to Manchester City this season (drinking game to come tomorrow). This weekend they play my roommate's team Newcastle United, who probably don't stand a chance. City is coming off a 1-0 win over Chelsea who had looked unstoppable so far this season.

Speaking of Chelsea, the game of the week is theirs against Arsenal. It airs at 11 am here and probably not on any channel that I have access to. Thankfully my favorite pub has a Sunday brunch...

This week's fantasy team:

I'm playing against the commissioner of my league who had the highest score last week. We have similar teams, he has more Arsenal players where I have as many Man City guys as I am allowed. I started the season with an all-Brazilian team with Irish subs, but as you can see, I made a few changes to losing the league. 

Go Irish. Beat Eagles.


Update: My roommate and I now have a beer riding on the Man City–Newcastle game. Let's go Citizens!

West Ham drinking game

Along the line of the Arsenal drinking game.  These are for those games you watch but don't really have a dog in the race. (Remember, most of these games start at 10 in the morning if not earlier for us Yankees.)

Drink 1:

• Yellow card

Drink 2:

• A fight breaks out in the stands (home games especially)
• Dives

Drink 3:

• Commentators mention Robert Green's World Cup performance
• Red Card

Finish your drink and go make a new one:

• Green lets a goal in that he should've saved.
• West Ham Utd Wins!

Giving Bill Simmons his due

Though I consider him crazy for trying to pick a Premier team on research and suggestions alone, I will give Bill Simmons some credit; he's figured out a way to become interested in a sport without the years of background, moving cities, or family history normally required to become a fan of a team. As he mentioned in his Third to Last Note of his 2010 NFL preview:

This is the 20th anniversary of my first NFL gambling season -- 1990 -- when I started betting with a college friend's cousin's bookie because I was so bored by another hideous Patriots season. At some point, I realized, "Wait a second, every time I bet on a team, I care about what happens in a football game for three hours! It's almost like renting a favorite team!" The rest was history.

That's right, friends: the answer is gambling. You don't need to arbitrarily pick a favorite team in order to have one every game. You simply need to put some money on it, which is exactly what 11 of my friends and I did this season for the Premier League. Getting up at 8 am on a Saturday morning is a lot easier with $20 out of my pocket and three pitchers of beer on the line.

If you think Fantasy NFL Football is nuts, you should attempt fantasy English Premier football: no draft, £100 million cap, and Didier Drogba to mess everything up. Like American football, you need to pay attention to injuries, but unlike the NFL, these teams are playing games outside the league during the week that count towards entirely separate champion Cups.

The Tiger-Cats could ruin everything!

Imagine that the Detroit Lions play the Bears on Sunday, but then on Tuesday have a game against the Hamilton Tiger-Cats of the Canadian Football League that will count towards a separate post-season Bowl (North American Bowl? Less-Super-But-Still-Cool Bowl?). Your starting wide receiver could play the whole game and then be rested or just lousy on the day that it counts for your team (and if he's Robbie Keane, he will play really well in the English Carling Cup game and never get you points on the weekend) (Jerk).

The point is that Premier League fantasy play has more variables than the NFL, and is another reason to pay attention to soccer, even if you don't have a favorite team to root for (or if your team is really bad, like the 1990 New England Patriots).

Don't be like this guy

I guess one of the reasons I'm writing this blog is in response to this guy. GuitarEarl is all for finding his own English Premier team, which is great.  It just seems he is going about it all wrong. He's trying to be logical about selecting a new team. I too tried to become a fan through research. I spent a week creating and perfecting a sweet chart that first identified different qualities of the teams and then gave those qualities arbitrary points and ranked them. I wasn't magically a fan of Everton after my chart told me they were a good fit.

What I am, however, is better informed about the Premier League than I had been. I can now carry on a conversation with people who are fans, which in the end is worth more than having one team to call "mine." I don't have any sweet swag to wear on Saturday mornings, but I can follow the game because I'm familiar with the players, I can decipher the chants out of the crowd, and I can occasionally even impart knowledge that comes from reading Wikipedia for hours on end.

So GUITAREARL of epltalk.com, it isn't that I think you are doing is bad. Over the next 30+ games I'm sure you will realize that some of your prejudices were unfounded and some of your research unnecessary, but your efforts won't make you enjoy the league any less. It's okay not to have a team, because we can still have fun, and watch the league for the love of the sport.

Choosing an EPL team

It happens every four years: Americans find that not only are they watching soccer for hours at a time, but that they actually enjoy it. Even after USA loses, they amaze themselves and watch the rest of the World Cup through to the finals.  "What a beautiful game," we think. "Hardly any ads and non-stop action. I wonder how I can see more of this?" A few of them have friends with the expanded sports packages that show the English Premier League and Serie A games, so they figured they'll just do a little research, pick a team and boom, they are a soccer fan.

People who think they can simply pick an English Premier League team as a way to start watching soccer are kidding themselves. 

Bill Simmons tried it. He maybe watched a few games but we didn't hear much from him about his love for soccer over the last four years (the two books focused on baseball and basketball might've been a factor). His problem was he likened choosing an EPL team to picking out a new car.  As dedicated a sports fan as he is, he should've known better.  Your 2010 Lexus hybrid SUV isn't going to break your heart, and it comes with a warranty.  The 2010 Arsenal team, on the other hand, probably will break your heart if you give them the opportunity, and the only condolence will be the thought of next season.

I'm not here to "pick" a team. What I'm hoping is to eventually fall in love with one.

Ironman and Love

Two weeks ago I was lucky enough to cheer my brother on at the Ironman Wisconsin. My expectations were that the family and I would see Dave when he was in town (start of the swim, start of the bike, and the beginning, middle and end of the marathon) and then spend the rest of the day shopping in downtown Madison and grabbing a pint or two at a pub with a view of the run.  In reality we were dashing about all day, racing from one spot to the next to cheer as loud as we could for about five seconds as he biked or ran past. 

But what really impressed me was how Dave's Ironman was a team effort between him and his amazing wife Melissa.  The day of the Ironman was also her birthday, and exactly two weeks short of their first wedding anniversary.  There was incredible sacrifice of time, energy and money on both of them this past year, but watching them throughout the day, you knew it was worth it. 

Last kiss before the start.

Arsenal Drinking Game

Watching football with a bunch of Gooners, we (non-Arsenal fans) developed a drinking game to keep us occupied:

Drink 1:

• Sanga looks indignant
• Arshavin throws the ball away
• Close-up of Chamakh's hair

Drink 2

• Announcer mentions Arsenal's attempts at picking up a new keeper
• Dives
• Player Snot Rockets
• U2 song plays

Drink 3:

• Almunia does something stupid

More tips for drinking game from a miserable DC United fan: DC United Drinking game