Dave’s Football Blog

You wanna know where football really comes from? Here, let me show you…

800 years ago, football was not an orderly battle between two teams of 11 people on a precisely measured pitch. No, football was a city-wide brawl. You had 1,000 guys on one team and 1,000 more on the other, and everyone played, and the playing field was the entire town.

What’s that? An offside rule? Please. You wanna know what a foul was in this football game? Manslaughter. Headbutting a guy in the chest was nothing. You could punch a guy in the head, kick him in the knee, knee him in the nuts, whatever. Is he still breathing? Yes? Play on!

Oh, and no cars or grocery bags. It’s football, dumbass. If you can’t carry a ball by your own power, there’s no use for you.

Yes, the only thing that mattered in this football game was that you got that ball to your opponent’s goal at the edge of town, and you used any means necessary to do it, whether it be kicking the ball or kicking that schmo in the shins. And when the game was over, everyone patched up their wounds, shook hands and said, “Let’s do it again next year.”

That’s where all your modern football games come from, kids, and that’s just how it was right up until the Industrial Revolution. In some places, it’s still like that. After all, why ruin a good tradition?

Yeah. Try playing that kind of football, JaMarcus Russell. Then we’ll find out how glad you really are to be in Oakland.

So I went out to an Irish pub in Raleigh on Friday night. The pub carried Setanta Sports, so I could watch a bit of the Richmond Tigers v. West Coast Eagles match. It cost $3 for parking, $5 for a cover charge, and $6 for a Newcastle and tip. Plus, the game started at midnight, so the pub was sure to kick me out midway through the 3rd quarter. All in all, I spent $14 to watch one half of live AFL footy.

Setanta Sports needs to hurry its ass up and get on Dish Network. Damn it.

West Coast Eagles 99, Richmond Tigers 76. The more I see David Wirrpanda in action, the more impressed I am with his skills. He was Johnny-on-the-spot all throughout the first half in this one, forcing key turnovers and igniting the Eagles’ 40-point 2nd quarter with an impossible goal. Wirrpanda had 3 goals, and Quinten Lynch had 4 goals for the still-unbeaten Eagles. Richmond drops to 0-5. Jay Schulz had a rough day, shanking four goal kick attempts for behinds. I’ve seen better kicking out of Chris Gardocki.

Collingwood Magpies 95, Essendon Bombers 79. Australia’s annual ANZAC Day celebration saw the ‘Pies fight off fatigue and inaccurate 4th-quarter kicking — 7 behinds in the 4th — to hold off Essendon and climb to 3-2 on the season. Anthony Rocca struggled late but finished with 22 points on 3 goals and 4 behinds, while Matthew J. Lloyd and Alwyn Davey led the Bombers with 20 points each.

Fremantle Dockers 58, Adelaide Crows 57. Here’s your upset of the week. Luke Webster broke a 57-57 tie with a late behind 20 seconds from the final siren to give the Dockers their second win in a row. Has Fremantle recovered from an 0-3 start to start challenging in the AFL?

Port Adelaide Power 96, St. Kilda Saints 43. And the Power just keeps on charging. They are now 4-1 on the season after spanking the Saints, whose offense just seems to disappear against quality teams. Warren Tredrea had 3 goals for the Power, while Shaun Burgoyne added 14 points and Brett Ebert scored 13 points. Those three alone outscored the Saints. Yikes.

Brisbane Lions 136, Carlton Blues 124. Shootout! Carlton had a 92-79 lead at the half, but a late Brisbane charge put this one away. Jonathan Brown led the Lions with 20 points and 15 marks, while Brendan Fevola tied six other players, including Brown, with 3 goals. The Lions are now 3-2, while Carlton drops to a disappointing 2-3. The Blues need to find some defense. They’ve given up a league-high 618 points so far this season.

Sydney Swans 109, Melbourne Demons 60. Confronting demons has never been easier than it’s been in Melbourne lately, where these Demons are the runaway favorites to win a wooden spoon. The Swans proved more far accurate than usual in this one, converting 17 of 20 shots on goal. Barry Fuckin’ Hall led the charge with 4 goals.

All the Round 5 scores and current standings are available from the AFL web site and, of course, Wikipedia.

Tell the truth. You don’t want to be inside watching the NFL Draft today. You want to head out to the beach, don’t you?

Ah, yes, the beach. The smell of the ocean. The wind in your hair. The sand in your shorts. That urine stench rising up from your leg because a jellyfish stung you and your buddy sprung into action with the ol’ “number one cure,” even though that episode of Friends was actually a damn, dirty lie…

And yet you can’t leave your football behind, can you? The ocean calls, but so does the game, even when there aren’t any actual games being played. Have no fear. At the edge of the ocean, you can find football again — no matter what type of football you prefer.

Beach Soccer

Association football is beach-tested and, believe it or not, FIFA-approved. Yes, in 2005, 13 years after a group called Beach Soccer Worldwide drew up the first set of rules, FIFA gave the game of beach soccer proper recognition as an official football game, and every year FIFA and BSWW organize the FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup, a competition that’s been dominated by Brazil since its inception as the Beach Soccer World Championships in 1995. Of course, the game was created in Brazil, so it’s no surprise that they kick sand in everyone else’s faces.

The game plays a bit like futsal on sand. It’s 5-on-5 with rolling substitutions on a pitch that’s about 35-to-37 meters long and 26-to-28 meters wide. Official matches are split into three 12-minute periods. There’s no offside rule, and the ability to shoot at goal from anywhere leads to high-scoring matches. There’s a shot on goal every 30 seconds on average, and there’s usually a goal scored every 3 minutes. Goalies have it rough in this game.

Oh, and there are no draws in beach soccer. You play a sudden death overtime period to determine the winner, and it goes to penalty kicks if nobody scores a golden goal. Works for me.

Beach Flag Football

Perhaps you prefer your football to be more of the gridiron variety. Well, the US Beach Flag Football Association has just the game for you. It’s a 6-on-6 co-ed football game that plays a lot like backyard football. You can’t draw a grid in the sand, so you have to complete two forward passes for a first down. It’s right there in the rules.

The USBFFA — and isn’t that abbreviation entertaining? — organizes league play and tournaments in Virginia Beach every summer. (Mmmmmm… Virginia Beach…) If you think you’ve got a team that can run with the best of them, go enter that tourney, and remember, if they can’t get your flag, they can’t get you. Barry Sanders said it, I believe it, and that settles that.

Beach Rugby

If you spend more time on the beaches of Italy, England or Australia than the beaches in Virginia, chances are you’ve seen some of the locals playing the type of football that doesn’t permit forward passes. Beach rugby patterns itself after rugby league in that there’s no rucking or mauling, and even scrums are replaced with something called a “tap kick,” depending on where you play. There are no goalposts, either, so all you can score are tries.

Some play a sort of flag rugby on the beach, while the Italians have a 3-second rule, where you have to give up the ball within three seconds after getting wrapped up by an opponent. NRL stars in Australia play in a Beach Footy tournament during the offseason that’s low-contact and known more for the babes than the game, which sounds about right for a beach event.

The pitch is similar in size to a beach soccer pitch, with end zones about 3-to-7 meters deep. Teams consist of 5-to-7 players on the sand at a time, with on-the-fly substitutions. Matches are really short, consisting of two halves only 5-to-7 minutes long, so it resembles rugby sevens in that regard. You could play a full beach rugby tournament in an afternoon if you wanted.

Beach Footvolley

Of course, if you want something completely different, try this on for size — a volleyball game in which you can’t use your hands. Yes, football and volleyball collide in the game of footvolley, which was born in Brazil and is all the rage in Rio de Janeiro and Miami. You could almost think of it as competitive kemari, since the object is to keep the ball in the air as long as possible.

The U.S. Footvolley Team leads the way in this country, organizing national tournaments in South Florida fairly often. Several big time footballers have been known to indulge in a little footvolley, though, including Ronaldo and Roberto Carlos. Because the sport is Brazilian in nature, footvolley tournaments tend to draw samba bands on the sidelines, and you know what that means — dancing girls at the games. I can get with that.

Of course, if you want to attract the hotties on the beach, any kind of football will do. Just ask Jessica Alba…

Yes, I think we need more beach football in our lives. Wouldn’t you agree?

Let’s be real here. 5th place is the new 1st place in the Premiership.

Only a few times this decade has a club not named Manchester United, Chelsea, Liverpool or Arsenal qualified for the Champions League in its current format. Those big four teams are far, far ahead of everyone else in terms of talent, prestige and cash on hand to buy more talent. The first three are owned by international billionaires, and Arsenal are about to be taken over by another one. This means that gap between the big four and the other 16 is about to widen even more.

So why the hell are the Gooner faithful complaining like they finished in last place?

Arsenal has had its share of injury trouble this season. Thierry Henry and Robbie Van Persie, the two strikers who helped the club beat Manchester United at Old Trafford earlier this year, have missed the better part of the second half of the season with injuries. That more than anything sunk the Gunners this year. They were bounced out of the Champions League knockout stage, lost early in the FA Cup, and defeated by Chelsea in the Carling Cup final. Now they find themselves with nothing to play for but a spot in next year’s Champions League qualifying round, which they will likely win easily.

Gooner fans, however, have treated this season as an abject failure, and at least one polite lad is growing sick of this.

All this criticism reflects badly on us as a community. I have been at The Emirates on more than one occasion this season when a 1-1 draw has resulted in a mixture of silence and profanity. Surely it would reflect better on us to applaud the side off? I’m just talking about a respectful applause, not necessarily celebrating a league point like we’ve won the Quadruple, ala (Aston) Villa and Newcastle this year…

After looking at the argument from both sides I think I have convinced myself that the level of disgruntlement amongst Gooners is too high at the moment and we need to reduce the amount of stick we are giving the team on the whole.

It’s funny to see the Gooners react this way, given that there are 16 Premiership clubs below them that would kill to be in the position Arsenal is in now — 9 points clear of 5th place and way up in goal differential. Everyone below the big four has nothing to play for but a UEFA Cup bid, and that would be a grand reward.

Not to fans at Emirates Stadium. Oh, no. To these people, UEFA Cup bids are for losers. They demand greatness at all times, superstar injuries be damned. And if this happens to Man U, Liverpool or Chelsea next year, you can expect the exact same reaction from those fans. These people cannot and will not accept a down year.

This sort of thing always happens when a team that’s so successful for so long suddenly has a slightly down year. The fans start getting pissy, and the haters on the other side revel in kicking those fans when their team is down. (I live in Durham, North Carolina. The exact same thing happened here during college basketball season.)

More importantly, though, this sort of fan negativity exposes the widening gap between the big four and the rest of the Premiership. 5th place is great success to 16 teams and completely unacceptable to the big four, who are the bullies of the block and will always be better because they can afford it.

This same gap exists in many other top divisions in Europe, too. How long have Barcelona and Real Madrid been the top teams in Spain? How long have clubs like Inter Milan, A.C. Milan and Juventus (before their match-fixing stupidity) dominated Italy? How long has Celtic owned the Scottish Premier League? Everywhere you look in Europe, you’ll find at least one club in each country that is just that far ahead of everyone else.

At what point do all these super-prestigious European clubs get together and decide to form their own Ultimate Euro League?

By season’s end, Chelsea will have played 38 Premiership matches, 12 Champions League matches, 7 FA Cup matches and 6 Carling Cup matches. At what point do they decide that this is too much and start talking to other clubs about the idea of a Champions League that’s an actual league, complete with its own separate competition and highly expensive TV rights?

Y’know, it’s almost worth watching the F.A. brown its trousers to find out…

Good citizens of Perth, lock up your Sudafed! Ben Cousins is out of rehab and coming home!

Cousins was expected to spend all of April and May at the luxurious Summit Centre, secluded somewhere in the Malibu hills. (Thanks, Wikipedia!) However, his rehab reportedly went so well that he’s returning to Australia this month. That’s the official explanation, anyway. He may have engineered a great escape that would make Steve McQueen proud.

Speaking of great escapes, Cousins appears to have escaped punishment from the AFL. (In other news, Pacman Jones called his travel agent and asked about airfare to Australia.) However, his return to the West Coast Eagles is still in question. Head coach John “Woosha” Worsfold lashed out at the AFL this week for its drug testing leaks — security for the AFL is provided by TJX, apparently — but stopped well short of saying that Cousins would be back on the pitch soon. The club wants a full assurance that Cousins has kicked his meth habit and will stay clean for the long haul.

And why should the Eagles be in any hurry, anyway? They’re the only undefeated team in the AFL right now, and they’re showing no signs of slowing down. Cousins could probably sit out the full season, and the Eagles would still be the top seed in the Finals Series. There’s no need to rush Cousins back. I bet he won’t see any action until July at the earliest.

Hell, he might as well have stayed in Malibu. Had he held out a little longer, he probably would have run into Lindsay Lohan — who would be a much better cure for a loss of girlfriend than a three-day ice bender, but that’s just my opinion…

While other football leagues around the world are playing actual games, the National Football League is finally running its annual college draft this weekend. I used to like to sneak away for the weekend and avoid the hype as best I could, because the NFL Draft is usually all sizzle and no steak. Imagine watching elephants play soccer. It’s fun for about 15 minutes. Eight hours later, though, you’re pondering which circle of hell this is, and how soon Mike Nifong will be joining you.

The constant talk leading up to this draft has been ridiculous, too. The NFL could have held this thing two weeks ago and let us all move on with our lives, but noooooooo. They had to let Mel Kiper Jr. yap for a full month. That’s the only way he can afford to keep his hair like that.

However, this is my first NFL Draft as an NFL FanHouse blogger. This means writing about the draft as it happens might actually make me some money. So if you want to read a bunch of snark-filled blogger reactions to what’s happening on the screen, stop by the FanHouse this weekend. You’ll also find fun stuff like this, this and this. (Yes, they’re letting me write a little about soccer over there now. Be afraid…)

I’ll have the non-NFL stuff here over the weekend, though, because I have to do something in between draft picks, but for a full-on NFL Draft orgy, the FanHouse is the place to be. See you over there.

Turns out that F.C. United of Manchester isn’t the only football club formed by fans of a top-tier club in that city. In fact, Manchester City fans created their own club a full 50 years before F.C. United, though they weren’t quite as disgruntled as those former Manchester United fans.

In 1955, a group of Man City supporters who liked to play football together themselves formed an amateur club called City Supporters Rusholme and competed in a local Sunday league in Manchester. They were so successful in those amateur matches that by the late 1960s, they opened a new office on Maine Road and became Maine Road F.C. They joined the Manchester Football League, a local league at Level 11 in the English League system, and by 1986, they had been promoted to the Northwest Counties Football League, where they have played ever since. Maine Road has a history of developing young players and dominating under-19 tournaments.

Maine Road has only been relegated once, from Divison One of the NWCFL to Division Two in in 2002. They were promoted back to Division One in 2004, but unlike F.C. United, they have yet to break through to the Unibond League. They’d probably like to do it soon, though, since the Maine Road-F.C. United match last November set the club record for attendance. (3,181) I have no idea what sort of relationship Maine Road has with Man City, but I’m guessing it’s just a bit less contentious than the relationship between F.C.U.M. and Man U.

Oh, by the way, the manager of the Maine Road first team? Chris Simms. Presumably, he’s the one that still has his spleen.

I know, I know. You’ve seen it at The FanHaus. You’ve seen it at With Leather. I don’t care. This message must be spread to the far corners of the world. Diving sucks.

This would have been a lot funnier, though, if that were Nicolas Anelka getting a cannon pointed at him…

Somehow, the Pittsburgh Steelers are still paying Chris Gardocki to punt for them, even though he averages about eight feet a kick these days. The team needs a new punter, and I’d like to suggest one — Anthony Rocca.

As that video shows, Rocca has the most booming leg you’ve ever seen. The two goal kicks he made in that video traveled a total distance of at least 140 meters. That’s 153 yards and change, folks, in two kicks.

Bill Parcells referred to another strong-legged Australian, Cowboys punter Mat McBriar, as a “weapon.” Indeed, Aussie Rules stars are attracting a lot of NFL attention. Anthony’s older brother, Saverio Rocca, is preparing to join the Philadelphia Eagles next season. Pittsburgh should try to bring Sav’s little brother in for a visit. It would do wonders for their field position.

I love this story, because it’s so unlike anything you see in American sports. I mean, if you hated Daniel Snyder before he bought the Washington Redskins, there wasn’t much you could do about it when he became owner. You could switch allegiances, but that was kind of drastic, especially if you grew up loving the Hogs. You could complain about it, but where would that get you?

That’s why I love how Manchester United fans responded when Malcolm Glazer bought their club in 2005. Sure, they yelled a lot and called Malcolm Glazer terrible things, but eventually, they realized that all that yelling couldn’t stop Glazer’s takeover. So they all said, “You know what? Screw Man U. We’re forming our own damn football club!”

That club is F.C. United of Manchester, though you can call them just F.C. United or F.C.U.M. (Nope, no implications toward the Glazer family in that abbreviation. None at all.) F.C. United may be far, far away from the glories of the Premier League, but that hasn’t stopped it from becoming one of the most popular non-league football clubs in England, ranking fifth among non-league clubs in attendance and keeping a six-figure bank account.

That support has translated to victories on the field. In 2005, F.C. United entered the North West Counties Football League Division 2 — for those keeping score at home, that’s level 10 in the English football league system — and they promptly won the league and got promoted to Division 1. They have already been confirmed as the Division 1 champions this season, and they will play in the UniBond League First Division next season. (If “UniBond League” sounds familiar to you, it may be because of this bit of nightmare fuel. You find the damnedest things on YouTube…)

Much of F.C. United’s manifesto revolves around an outright rejection of commercialism in football. The club, which was formed as an industrial and provident society (whatever that means), strives to be “be accessible to all, discriminating against none,” encouraging youth and community participation in the game of football. Its goals include promotion to Conference North (level 6 in the English league system) and an average attendance of 5,000 per game by 2009, and its own stadium in Greater Manchester with a seating capacity of up to 10,000 by 2012.

If this club ever makes it into the Football League — and at their current rate, this would happen in 2011 — I have my doubts that it will hold on to those non-commercial principles in its manifesto. A flush of cash always changes things, especially in football. Regardless, it’s just awesome to see a whole group of fans break away from their chosen club and build their own. If F.C.U.M. ever draw Man U in an FA Cup match, the whole city of Manchester is going to go batshit bonkers.

I wonder how much it costs to become a sponsor. You can’t put your name on the club jerseys, but you can get your name on the match ball. I think an inquiry is in order…

(Props to The Offside.)