Sports- Germany vs. Italy
posted in Sports |I fear that I’m going to make some enemies with this post. But if you can’t
just lay it out in a blog, what’s the point? Today I set the Media Center PC to
record the Germany vs. Italy game. I also set to record the next two programs
since the games often go over the “allotted” 120 minutes in the ESPN schedule,
but ESPN does keep showing the whole thing. Note- this is not a slam on ESPN at
all- while I suppose you could complain about some of the commentary, overall
the World Cup coverage in the US has improved 10000% in the past few years and
watching not-interrupted by commercials games all the way through is great. When
I went to watch it I discovered that the Media Center had screwed up and only
recorded 12 minutes of the main game. So I skipped forward to the next “show”
and sure enough the game was 0-0 in overtime! Thank you Media Center for saving
me from 90 minutes of crappy soccer.
At which point I need to remind folks that this was a game with Germany
playing. Look, if you want to convince a typical American that their stereotypes
about soccer are wrong, show them any game with the Brazilian team. Even losing
(rare) they do it with big smiles, stylish moves, and keep playing hard on the
attack the whole time. If you want to convince that same American that their
stereotypes are 100% right, show them a game with the Germans. Let’s just say I
wasn’t shocked to see a 0-0 tie although a 1-0 victory with 75 minutes of
defensive boring play would have been more typical.
Anyway, the overtime was very cool, the Italians scored a beautiful goal with
1 minute left and then followed it up with another beautiful goal catching most
of the German team on the attack. That 1 minute would have been worth sitting
through the preceding 119 minutes (although thankfully my Media Center had saved
me from 80 of those minutes). Now the final game next Sunday becomes something
I’m really looking forward to, especially if the French win tomorrow.
]]>