Touching is good. It’s a display of endearment, a bonding behavior, an affectionate act.
Touching is bad. It’s a display of aggression, a divisive behavior, a violent act.
Contrary to popular belief, referees are people too. They like good touch. They don’t like bad touch. On Sunday, Cristiano Ronaldo did a bad touch. The referee didn’t like it. Ronaldo is suspended five matches.
It never ceases to amaze me that with a 23-year-old Lionel Messi entering the height of his powers as a footballer, the Argentine Football Association decided to put Diego Maradona in charge of the national team for the 2010 World Cup. In his previous managerial experience, Maradona had collected three wins, eight draws and 12 losses, good for a win percentage of 13%.
Portland Timbers fans will be crushed to hear that the hipster-est football hipster in the known universe has been discovered, and he wasn't found at Providence Park.
Rather, the most hipster man in football was spotted at Estadio Corona on Sunday at Santos Laguna's clash with Veracruz. Bask in this man's ironic glory:
Cristiano Ronaldo is an incredible footballer, blessed with size, speed, strength, foot skiils and awareness that would be the envy of pretty much anyone. Luis Suarez is also blessed in all these categories, just not as much as Ronaldo.
There is one skill, though, in which Ronaldo will never match Suarez's unbelievable talent: acting.
Ronaldo and Suarez each attempted dives during Sunday's Spanish Super Copa first leg. Suarez won a penalty (which Lionel Messi converted), but Ronaldo was given his second yellow card and dismissed from the match.
So what went wrong?
In between bashing the American president and delving into the North Korea problem, late night host John Oliver presented a segment that was actually useful to Americans on his Last Week Tonight program Sunday night. The HBO show illustrated how Univision Deportes announcer Luis Omar Tapia makes everything more exciting — robot soccer included.
There’s no sight in football quite like that of a marauding center half. These moments invariably begin with the blundering oaf picking his head up and trying to spot a midfielder or defensive partner to lay the ball off to. Seeing all these options closed down, he’ll realize that he’s got about 15 yards of open real estate in front of him and those gangly legs will start churning.
This weekend, Barcelona began their season with a 3-1 steamrolling at the hands of Real Madrid. The first goal came at the hands of Barcelona center back Gerard Pique, who hates Real Madrid with the fiery white-hot passion of a thousand suns and was none too pleased about putting the ball into his own net so Madrid didn't have to.
To accentuate Pique's sadness, some intrepid Internet person set Pique's Blunder to the saddest song in popular culture, courtesy of Celine Dion.
There was a moment in the Copa America Cenenario when I saw 11 men realize the true meaning of fear. It was in the semifinal between the United States and Argentina. Argentina were up 1-0 and had just won a free kick in a dangerous area. Lionel Messi stood over the ball as Brad Guzan set up his wall. Then Messi bent down and tied his shoes. It was the most terrifying thing I've seen in my life. You knew right then that he was going to score and there was nothing the USA could do about it.