To boo or not boo, that is the question
Roar Pro By Con Stamocostas, 15 Oct 2008 Con Stamocostas is a Roar Pro
- Tagged:
- Beckham, Champions League, David Beckham, Galatasaray, Harry Kewell, Kevin Muscat, Roma, Wayne Rooney
I wonder if booing is embedded in the English pysche so much that it is a permanent reaction to not having your expectations met, neither as a football fan nor as human being.
Only the English would boo Bob Dylan because he had the gall to play electric guitar in the second part of a concert.
Eliciting a famous response by an upset punter who said “Bob Dylan played like a bastard in the second half,” Frank Lampard always cops boos from the England fans it, but you really can’t feel sorry for him, can you?
How many goals can you score from deflections?
After Ashley Cole played a poor back pass from which Kazakhstan scored, sections of the crowd at Wembley preceded to boo him after every touch he made.
The English like to choose their villains from their own teams: David Beckham, Wayne Rooney and John Barnes all had sections from the home support boo them during their England career.
When I was in Rome in 2002, I was lucky enough to see a Champions League game between Roma and Galatasaray, the team Harry Kewell now plays for.
While the Romans chanted “Death to Istanbul” after the game (the score was 1-1), the best booing action came at half time. On the big screen you could see the camera was panning around the ground and stopping at random people.
If it stopped at a pretty girl, the sixty thousand crowd would cheer emphatically. If it stopped at a not so pretty girl, the crowd would boo.
So the English boo their own players, the Italians boo their own crowd, and the Australians boo the referee and Kevin Muscat.
And that’s the way it should be.
Recommend this story.
- Explore:
- Beckham, Champions League, David Beckham, Galatasaray, Harry Kewell, Kevin Muscat, Roma, Wayne Rooney
October 16th 2008 @ 2:13am
Colin N said | October 16th 2008 @ 2:13am | Report comment
Here in England, most England fans support lower league teams and Ashley Cole embed’s everthing that ‘s wrong about Football-the money, greed, attitude etc. I’m not saying it’s right but Ashley Cole isn’t universally liked it is fair to say in England. He was criticised for the incident with Mike Dean and also refused to sign a new deal at Arsenal because he thought 55,000 a week wasn’t enough.
Booing does go one in Rugby Union very rarely, usually when their team loses to a team they shouldn’t have. It goes on a lot in League though.
October 16th 2008 @ 8:06am
Slippery Jim said | October 16th 2008 @ 8:06am | Report comment
dasilva, Les and Foster can have their opinions, however English football is certainly not their forte.
Someone far more credible is former FIFA world player Ronaldinho, who several times has called Frank Lampard a “great player” who he wanted to have playing with him when he was at Barcelona.
When David Villa, Joaquin were asked to name the five best players in the world recently, they both named Frank Lampard in their list.
Inter president early this year said “everybody considers Frank Lampard a great player” and called him their number 1 transfer target.
Jose Mourinho, of course, famously called Frank the “best player in the world”, recently he also said of him “Lampard is incredibly professional. Players admire the kind of character of people who are ready to die to win, God gave players the talent but some of them with this kind of mentality make themselves better. These are the kind of the players that can last forever.”
Gerrard, in 2005 called Frank Lampard a “great player” as well, going further in saying “at the moment on current form he is the best in the world”.
Every single one of these people is far more credible in their opinions on English football than Foster or Les, who have made it abundantly clear over the years that they despise anything English, and only have effusive praise for players with a Brazilian or Argentinian passport.
October 16th 2008 @ 8:12am
Midfielder said | October 16th 2008 @ 8:12am | Report comment
SJ
Well said
October 16th 2008 @ 12:17pm
Slippery Jim said | October 16th 2008 @ 12:17pm | Report comment
A great, and amusing, article by the magnificent Giles Smith about the recent booing incident:
http://www.chelseafc.com/page/ColumnistsDetails/0,,10268~1421163,00.html
October 16th 2008 @ 1:16pm
dasilva said | October 16th 2008 @ 1:16pm | Report comment
In all honesty SJ
don’t get too serious about my comment. It was just useless exposition on your comment. I don’t watch enough English football (or european football in general) to participate in this debate about how great lampard is.
Who’s the best player in the world is often a subjective thing and many people have different opinions. For every one who says Lampard is a better player there are other people who says Gerrard. I’ll definitely not saying that Les and Craig opinions are worth more then anyone else.
In any case I’ll disagree the last point about anti-English of SBS whic his often exagerrated. There has been effusive praised for English players in the past that are often overlooked by people as it doesn’t fit with the anti-English stereotypes including praise for the likes of Joe Cole, Ferdinand, Ashley Cole, Gerrard and Beckham and past England great players (and managers).
October 16th 2008 @ 2:56pm
Dan King said | October 16th 2008 @ 2:56pm | Report comment
Aussies boo each other…. e.g., any player in league about to take a kick or any rival team entering the field…. see State of Origin, been many times.
You gotta love self righteous Aussies though.