soccer

World Cup, Bro …

So that happened. The action kicked off yesterday and in the 11th minute, there was the calamity brought about by players who aren’t used to one another. A cross through the Brazil penalty box (and it was a very dangerous cross that could have gotten results in any league against any team) whistled past a Croatian player and two Brazilians before Marcelo deftly flicked it in … to his own net. He hadn’t expected the ball to get to him, what with the ball having to skitter past two teammates to get there. It appeared that both...

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The World Cup Trophy Is Not a Cup, and Many Other Words

Hi everybody! (Stranger danger!) I’m the writer formerly known as Ghost. In the first iteration of this here blog, I mostly stuck to sports and booze, dabbling in the religion and politics beats — which is essentially how I spend my real life as well. There’s a really big sports event about to start in a few hours, so I figured now would be as good a time as any to make the first of possibly many infrequent contributions. I am not good at “blogging” both because I do not post regularly and because when I do,...

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Let the Eagle Soar

The mighty United States today beat Algeria 1-0 with a goal in the 91st minute. Since England beat Slovenia (at the same time) 1-0, it means (based on goals scored) that the mighty United States won their group and advance to the next round (whoo!).

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"The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave."

It\’s like bringin a knife to a gunfight, pen to a test Your chest in the line of fire witcha thin-ass vest You bringin them Boyz II Men, HOW them boys gon\’ win? – Jay-Z, The Takeover When I moved to Boston, I lived in East Somerville. It\’s a working class neighborhood full of Brazilians and Portuguese, and in any other soccer story, any other match preview, I might write about the sounds and sights of East Somerville in June 2006. But this is a story about tomorrow\’s match, the first US match of this World Cup,...

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Champions and Also-Rans

The British Parliament is holding elections on Thursday, with perennial majority Labour looking certain to lose 10 Downing St. to the Tories, or perhaps the Liberal Democrats. Today, Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester City — the English football teams supported by Ghost of Hemingway’s Gun and Estes, respectively, square off in Manchester to potentially decide who finishes fourth in the English Premier League, reaping the financial windfall (and prestige bump) of appearing in the Champions League, in which neither has appeared for at least a decade. Estes and I are here to guide you through both of these...

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