Holland through to the Final

by anderson

(AMSTERDAM) - Holland is in the final.  Despite the recent WC octopus' prediction, most expect the Netherlands will face Germany, the thought of which freaks out the Dutch.  Of course, they want to win, but what if they loose?  This weighs heavily on the Dutch mind.  But, the reality is that everyone in the world would like to see Holland beat Germany.  No two ways about it.  I may get in trouble for saying this, but it is the truth.  Even Germans are freaked out --  hassling immigrants in Duitsland who are waving the German flag in support.

The game against Uruguay was a stunner, easily the best of the tournament. Uruguay proudly presented their own enfant terribl�Diego Forl� who struck from a distance to tie the game 1-1 going into half time.  The initial Dutch goal was easily the best long strike of the World Cup, punted in by van Bronckhorst from 25 metres, and dashing in off the high post.  Replete with astonishing strikes, rigid Dutch control, and what can only be described as a nail-biter finish, the game captured, as Uruguay pressed the deep ball hard, and did it repeatedly in the closing minutes.

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It is unbound, bloody madness here in Amsterdam tonight.  Plain, unadorned madness. In orange.  Streets are filled with orange-fuzz revelers, screeching orange vuvuzelas, raucous howling, whistling, cheering, laughing, shouting, cars horns, back beat.  An organic discotheque has formed on the pavement nearby. There is a thick cloud of boisterous noise permeating the city.  They were filling the fountains here with orange stuff after the last game.  Who knows what the city will look like in the next few days ... duh, duh, duh, until the final on Sunday.

All along my street, businesses, houses, bars, have televisions outside, some sporting elaborate projection systems, giant  flat screens.  One bar ordered, especially for the World Cup, two brand new monster teevees.  Some of the bars have constructed temporary outdoor  mini-theatres with blanketing shrouding whatever large format screen they are employing -- right now, it is fair daylight until about 11:00pm.

I've never given much attention to the World Cup before, what with living in the US 'n all back then.  You don't have a great choice there either, really.  The times are all weird, making it ... uncomfortable to watch an "evening" game.  But even so, I was in the US when they hosted the World Cup, and the event barely got a notice by the typical media, which sees nothing that it does not want to see.

But when you are here, in the middle of it, with these football nuts surrounding you, infecting you, wearing weird orange stuff all over their bodies, and laughing, and smiling, and hugging everyone, and all the day is a great, grand feeling, well, you just have to come at least near to loving the game.

But if I do not "love" game, I have come to appreciate it significantly more than I've ever considered before.  For one, Europe makes it fairly easy to appreciate the sport -- it is everywhere.  Too much, really. European sport pages are eye-openers to Amerincaners used to the usual drab doses of the NFL, NBA, MLB rundown.  The first several sport pages of any paper, at any time of year in Europe, will be football (soccer), followed, depending on the season, by more football, cricket, rugby, cycling (big tours), cross country skiing, Formula One, MotoGP, tennis, golf, field hockey, fencing.  And not once will you see the name "Kobe Bryant" anywhere.  Which, I have to say, is a nice breath of sporting fresh air.

And two, it really is a beautiful game: watched distance, it takes on the cloak of a danse macabre: fluid, yet riddled with jabs and starts; from antagonistic slow waltz, to sudden, shocking strike.  It can take on elements of the bizarre, as all good sports can, as when back-to-back penalty kicks in the Spain-Paraguay game were thwarted in a penalty-riddled and confused way.  World Cup football, so far as I have witnessed, is a game of Snake & Mongoose.  It is a game that requires a long view, an evolution, both in practice and observation.  Most North Americans expect sporting excitement to be instantly gratifying, even though their own cherished examples of sport often fail to genuinely deliver.

Rambling enough.  Take in the last two games of the 2010 World Cup folks, if you can.  It's a helluva show.  It gives one faith that we, as humans, can still come together to celebrate and enjoy our own human company.