From: mppu3@syma.sussex.ac.uk (Conor McMenamin)
Newsgroups: rec.sport.soccer
Subject: Re: Soccer in Barcelona 92 & New Rules
Date: 14 Aug 92 08:50:12 GMT
Organization: University of Sussex

mlindroos@abo.fi writes:
	<Bob's stuff removed for brevity (sorry Bob!!)>
: 
: [Yawn.] Thanks, Robert. Nice post although I doubt the message is going to sink
: in this time either. Some self-proclaimed "experts" just won't believe that
: NBC & co. do *NOT* control (or even care that much about-) soccer. Maybe we
: should make a r.s.soccer FAQ list someday and include Robert's paragraphs
: above, file under "Americans bastardizing soccer":-)
                                            ^^^^^^ Do what you like to
'soccer'. Just leave me a decent game of football (but that's another story:-).

	<More of Bob's removed (can you ever forgive me?)>

: A good point, again. There is *nothing* wrong with the game itself as long as
: it is played the way it was meant do be played. That is, by two teams that want
: to WIN. It's the acting, the Greg Louganis-style faked dives inside the penalty
: area, the time-wasting and the endless bouncing and juggling by the goalies
: that puts people off. 
Couldn't agree more.
:                        Now, my old pal Ferdi is waxing our ears again with that
: old "instruct the referees/change attitudes - not rules" refrain. I am sorry,
: but it doesn't work (as if the refs don't have enough things to do already).
: FIFA have been trying to for the last thirty years, with no success.

Absolutely. Give the refs a break.

: Those Americans everyone seems to be so concerned about will have no trouble at
: all if the average score turns out to be 1-0 again. Their own baseball (five
: runs per game) and American Football (six touchdowns per game in the NFL) are
: not necessarily more "open" than soccer in this respect. What NO ONE should
: be forced to put up with is the time wasting trash only soccer seems to accept
: as a "natural part" of the game.

	Only football? Do we live on a different planet?

:                                  Basketball has its shot clock, hockey states
: that the puck must be kept in motion, American Football demands that the ball
: be brought back in play within 30 seconds etc..

	Not exactly an internationalist are you? All these sports seem
to have a heavy American influence either in terms of world domination
or in being the only suckers who play it...there are many sports where
time is lost from the game as a matter of course; examples include
(field [puke]) hockey, rugby union (not exactly a worldwide one this,
but they do play it in the US of A!) etc. Also in at least two of the
sports mentioned above (I'm an ignoramus on baseball!) they have 'Time
outs', when the whole game stops and all the players go off for a chat
with their coach and a bit of a rest, in American Football the game is
regularly delayed by the teams being changed....I have heard that
gridiron games will often take 3 hours to finish one hour of playing
time. Isn't this just an example of organised 'time wasting'? Just
because it's part of the rules doesn't make it great to watch!

: Preventing goalies from using their hands on backpasses was a good start.

Couldn't agree more. Despite the chances of unlikely loopholes etc. it's
a step in the right direction.

: Too bad FIFA didn't ban all backpasses from outside the penalty area, like
: team handball does.

Erm, how exactly do you distinguish between the backpasses that have
already been banned and 'backpasses from outside the penalty area'? It
seems to me that backpasses from outside the penalty area is a subset of
backpasses in general, so banning the latter bans the former-or have I
missed something?
:                     That would be my next step, 
Which is why you're not on any FIFA body, presumably. You'd only confuse
them, the poor old blighters. {By the way, this doesn't refer to the USA
in general before I get some racist tarwiththesamebrush etcetc flame:-}
:                                                 and any player who tries to 
: get around it by ballooning the ball into the stands gets booked.

Oh dear. LARGE amounts of confusion here. How is 'ballooning the ball
into the stands' in any way equivalent to a backpass? With a backpass you
retained possesion, by kicking the ball out of play you lose it. Hardly
getting round it, is it? Or have I missed something here as well? Any
player who thinks he's getting round it by kicking the ball out of play
wants to spend some time in an institution, not just get a yellow card!

:                                                                   Also, the
: goalie should not be allowed to block or hold the ball with his hands for 
: more than approx. one second (like in ice hockey). If he does, the other team 
: gets a lateral throw-in from the sidelines.

	Great rule this is! That would be fun, just cluster 5
men round the keeper and cross it to him. Then wait a second for him to
try to play the ball and away you go. Anyone remember what Bestie did to
Gordon Banks? It'd be the new craze! And how do you mean 'block' the
ball? If the keeper blocks the ball it usually falls on the ground, kind
of precluding any more blocking being necessary until someone else plays
the ball.

:                                             Finally, I have two rules that
: would apply ONLY to professional/international soccer.

Can't wait.

:                                                        The first thing is
: to stop the clock every time the ball is not in play (injuries, corners, goal-
: kicks, free-kicks, throw-ins etc.). Obviously, the match time would have to
: be shorter than 90 minutes as about 40-50 minutes are normally lost due to
: time wasting and the like.

During EC '92, they were kind enough to give us a measurement of the
time the ball was in play. I would have said the average there was
about 30 minutes of play per half(just by watching the games-does
anybody know what the average actually was?), so about 30 minutes were
lost per game. This may seem unreasonable unless you consider that the
game then lasts for 60 minutes. I get tired enough after this length of
time! And for any extended stoppage the clock is already stopped
anyway, at all levels of football, so why have you included injuries
in your list? Or is it the case that you don't actually know that much
about the rules of the game as they stand anyway? No no, I'm sorry. You
wouldn't have wasted all that space if you didn't know the rules
already, that would have been stupid. So I must have missed something again.
Sorry.

:                            The second would be a separate 30-second 
: clock similar to basketball's 10-second-rule. For those of you not familiar
: with basketball, this means that as soon as the defending team gains possession
: of the ball, they have thirty seconds to get it out of their own half of play.
: The clock is reset every time the attacking team touches it. Simple isn't it?

Not as simple as you make out. You'd also have to ban passes back over
the half way line, else teams could just reset the clock by passing into
the oppo's half, then passing it back. So you do that and what do you end
up with? Enforced 'Route One'-and ask anyone who's been to see
Wimbledon, it's not good to watch.

: These four proposals would completely kill all forms of timewasting while not
: having a direct influence on the actual game.     

NOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

	I don't claim to be a football expert, just a lover of the game.
It is exactly this kind of drivel that draws all the whining about
'Americanizing' football. There are a lot of people on rss, and around
the world, who like football pretty much the way it is. Let's just hope
FIFA remember that there is life after '94, and that the Brazilians,
Argentinians, British, Italians, Spanish, French, Columbians,
Cameroonians, Koreans, ex-Yugoslavians, even a few Aussies(!) etcetc
like football, and don't want to play some awful game that was invented
(by FIFA-not by the USA!) to sell a sport to one country and their TV
networks. If they want it, let them come and get it. We shouldn't bring it
to them.

Conor.