How to make soccer more exciting?

[Angel4576]

As far as 'offside' goes, perhaps Fifa should just try and NOT change it at the drop of a hat. They seem to change the nuance of the rule every other season. 'daylight/no daylight', 'interfering with play/not interfering with play', just pick something and fcuking stick with it FFS!

A fixed offside line wouldn't work in football. What happens when you get a freekick just outside the 'line'? Offside as soon as you swing it in?

As has been pointed out many, many times in this thread, there's no need to change anything, it's not played by every nation on earth because it lacks excitement.

The US vs Algeria game was a fantastic spectacle oozing excitement, but games like that are made even more special by the fact that not all games are as dramatic.

Besides, there's more to football than just scoring goals, the art of defending is just as an important aspect of the game as knocking the ball into the net.

 

[Danny99]

I still think it's to each their own.

I like European Football. I like American Football.

Tennis bores me to no end, golf is only fun to play; not to watch, and why is the Tour de France televised?

 

[Angel4576]

Previously chess has been televised. Seriously, WTF?

 

[Count Zero]

A lot of sports takes really long. That's always been my problem with tennis. Sure, a match can be over after an hour but it can also take 3 or 4 hours.
I used to watch the Tour de France. It can definetely be very exciting but again, it takes a long time to get to the crucial points. And nowadays, the sport is just tainted due to the widespread doping.

 

[the 4th hanson bro]

Soccer is what it is. If you want soccer to be more exciting, take the time to learn about the game and watch more of it than just once every 4 years for a month.

You know, I'm not even going to read the rest of the thread. Your response here is too good. Let me just add to it: Put in a fucking blue line, call offsides the same way as hockey, and soccer's problems will all be solved.

Then you make soccer into hockey on grass and the whole nature/tone/ character of the sport changes and it's now suddenly something quite like, but not exactly soccer.

If you're ever in the state of Wisconsin during the months of October to March, look me up. I'll take you to see whomever the University of Wisconsin is playing in hockey during your stay. I'll prove to you not only that a fixed offsides zone is superior,

Different game, different rules, different strategy on a much smaller surface.

but I'll show you some of the greatest (worst?) fans on earth at harassing officials and the visitors.

"that's debatable!"

 

[Pemmer Harge]

See, the thing is, in football goals matter. It's not easy to score so it takes skill and luck and all that good stuff. There's a shock to it, a joy. In other sports, like basketball, people score so often that it becomes numbing. Because goals matter so much in football, there's always tension whenever your team's goal is threatened, frustration when your team fail to score and release when they do. It's a subtle game and even games where no one scores can be very entertaining.

Frankly, the reason Americans don't like it so much, is, well, there is no reason beyond historical accident. Other games happened to become popular in America, whereas in most of the rest of the world, football became the number one sport.

 

[Maestro]

"that's debatable!"

"Your wife's inflatable!"

Pardon me, I'm going to have to listen to Timewarp now.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

NFL football players hit far harder than rugby players do.

True. Because they have padded armours. Take them away, and they will hit just like rugby players (obviously: no one wants to break their ribs or maybe their neck at every impact). It's not a matter of which sport is better: they are just very different beasts.

That does happen far too often in American football, unfortunately.

BTW, as I guy who is a hockey fan, I'm going to state my absolute objection to a blueline in soccer. I like soccer's offsides rule. In spirit, it's really good at preventing cherry picking without ruining the fluidity of the sport. I just hate when it's used for other purposes (when everyone is so close together that there is no cherry picking) or when the refs fuck up (short of replay, there's not much that could be done about that).

 

[HappyDayRiot]

Previously chess has been televised. Seriously, WTF?

Don't forget The International Staring Championships.

Kudos to anyone who gets that one...

 

[Turtletrekker]

Football is not all about the score, it's about the beauty of the gesture.

So is synchronized swimming, and that's boring too.

You see, I like baseball because every pitch can matter. There's a lot of intensity in the littlest of things.

[SISKO] "It's Linear!" [/SISKO]
Agreed completely.

BTW, I'd also argue that those who say the way to improve American football is to remove pads doesn't understand the game and quite possibly hasn't really watched much of it. There are problems with football related to too many commercial breaks, but the stop-start nature doesn't really matter too much if the game is moving.

Snipers in the crowd.

Tennis bores me to no end, golf is only fun to play; not to watch, and why is the Tour de France televised?

I kid you not, American cable sports channels televise poker tournaments.

For my money, while I don't care for the standard version of the game, I actually find Indoor Soccer to be quite exciting. With the bounce-back off the walls, and a smaller arena, the games have a much faster pace, similar to hockey. I used to be a fan of the old Tacoma Stars back in the original MISL.

 

[ITL]

Previously chess has been televised. Seriously, WTF?

Don't forget The International Staring Championships.

Kudos to anyone who gets that one...

I claim my Kudos.

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjmUduvaRx0[/yt]

 

[Shaytan]

Football is not all about the score, it's about the beauty of the gesture.

So is synchronized swimming, and that's boring too.

I'm sure the people who are into synchronized swimming would disagree.

 

[HappyDayRiot]

Previously chess has been televised. Seriously, WTF?

Don't forget The International Staring Championships.

Kudos to anyone who gets that one...

I claim my Kudos.

Excellent!

I also quite like indoor football - Sky show a lot of it over here in the form of Masters Football. It has the added interest of dragging up 40+ year old legends, as well as balls bouncing off walls, the ball entering the arena from the roof, and for any goals scored during injury time to count double.

Great way to start a cold Saturday morning before the lunchtime KO!

 

[PlainSimpleJoel]

It was sort of the European Cup of American Football, Berlin Adler vs Vienna Vikings, amateur teams, but they take it very seriously and there were 5000 people in the stadium.

I remember seeing a story about it being played here also. Called Gridiron Australia (thanks to wiki).

Just like many traditional Australian sports are played in other countries, such as the AMNRL (American National Rugby League) on the east coast of the USA. I hope it becomes successful and future expansions happen, as there is room in USA for more football, besides the NFL, which doesn't really interest me.

NFL football players hit far harder than rugby players do.

First off - an important fact. There are two codes of rugby. Union and League. Both are different, in terms of rules, players and style of play. I remember having a similar debate about this with Alidar Jarok a few years ago in the old chat room.

Rugby Union and then American/Canadian Football and Rugby League, Australian Rules Football, Gaelic Football, all of these developed because the vanilla version of football wasn't quite good enough for them.

League developed out of union in Yorkshire first off, and other northern states in UK followed around 1895. It had nothing to do with soccer/football.

I still think it's to each their own.

So true. The sports I love are rugby league and cricket. I know many folks here on trekbbs aren't interested in either, but I can to other places if I want to talk about the sports I love.

 

[Chaos Descending]

Rugby Union and then American/Canadian Football and Rugby League, Australian Rules Football, Gaelic Football, all of these developed because the vanilla version of football wasn't quite good enough for them.

League developed out of union in Yorkshire first off, and other northern states in UK followed around 1895. It had nothing to do with soccer/football.

Who said that it did?

 

[Starkers]

See, the thing is, in football goals matter. It's not easy to score so it takes skill and luck and all that good stuff. There's a shock to it, a joy. In other sports, like basketball, people score so often that it becomes numbing. Because goals matter so much in football, there's always tension whenever your team's goal is threatened, frustration when your team fail to score and release when they do. It's a subtle game and even games where no one scores can be very entertaining.

Quoted for truth!

 

[Marten]

It didn't become the world's most popular sport because it's boring.

 

[Chaos Descending]

It didn't become the world's most popular sport because it's boring.

That's very true, it became the world's most popular sport despite being boring.

 

[The Borgified Corpse]

I have seen plenty of them in threads about the World Cup, with people trouncing about yelling "soccer sucks!" to anyone willing to hear. However, since Americans are the majority of people on this board, it could just be a statistical thing.

Plus, the sports fans here have a bit more time on their hands since the NBA, NFL, & NHL are all on hiatus. (We're right in the thick of baseball season, but considering how the Diamondbacks are doing right now, it's best if I don't think about that.)

I don't know, the demand to be accomodated in one's own sports watching way over hundreds of millions of people who enjoy football as it is just rubs me the wrong way, I guess.
I wouldn't demand American Football to change just so that I don't find it boring anymore. Or any other sport I'm not interested in.

It was less a demand and more of an intellectual exercise; trying to figure out how to drive up the scores in soccer. There's certainly a strong demand in most of the American sports leagues to search for ways to drive up the scores. Baseball is often viewed as more exciting with a bunch of juiced up players challenging each other for home run records. In the mid-1990s, the NBA tried to increase scores by moving the 3-point line from 23'7" to 22'. (However, when scores continued to go down, the NBA theorized that moving the 3-point line ruined teams' spacing, so they moved it back.)

 

[CommanderRaytas]

It didn't become the world's most popular sport because it's boring.

That's very true, it became the world's most popular sport despite being boring.

Football is the most exciting game there is, or ever will be!

I can't believe I'll have to go without football for the next month until the Bundesliga season begins. Meh.