Thursday, July 23, 2009

Soccer Is Cool: I'm Finally Hooked


Last night I experienced my first-ever live soccer event as A.C. Milan (Italy) took on Club America (Mexico) at the Georgia Dome as part of the World Soccer Challenge. I realized that I am now a big soccer fan and I’m here to recruit as many folks as I can get to join me.
If you’ve ever seen hockey live, then you’ll have somewhat of a feel for what a soccer game with two top clubs feels like.
I’ll be honest when I say that I was expecting maybe 25,000 fans to attend the game at the Georgia Dome, which holds 72,000, so my brother Michael and I were pretty shocked when we saw the crowds gathered at the ticket lines. By the way Mike, thanks for the ticket, bro. And we were even more shocked when we heard the final attendance announced at 50,000-plus.
What also helped to make the event exciting was the fact that we saw a total of three goals scored as Club America defeated A.C. Milan 2-1. The Mariachi band that serenaded Club America from the upper deck after halftime was also quite cool to see.
It was also really cool to see the fans, who were decidedly in favor of Club America, cheer for their team when they scored, but also for Milan when they scored their goal to tie the game late in the second half.
It was clear to me that the fans were truly fans of the Beautiful Game and were just thrilled to have the opportunity to see a game of this caliber, regardless of whether or not their team was victorious. Of course, Club America winning late in thrilling fashion was just the capper for me, as well as 50,000 other screaming soccer fans in Atlanta.
Ronaldinho of A.C. Milan also helped to entertain us as we saw several great dribbles and passes from him, as well as accurate corner kicks from one of the greatest players in the world. Seeing him do his patented Samba with the ball, and through and around defenders, was one of the coolest things I’ve seen in sports and something I’ll never forget.
So here’s to you soccer, or futbol, either way is cool with me, but I can’t wait to catch the next Team USA game whenever that may be. I also can’t wait for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. Maybe some of us here in the States will be pleasantly surprised, at least that’s what I’ll be hoping for.

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