Do you remember Gene Hackman's portrayal of the Indiana basketball coach in Hoosiers? Remember how he insisted that the team pass the ball a minimum number of times before taking any shots, even if an open shot were available before reaching that minimum? His coaching theory aimed at teaching the idea that team work, rather than individual showmanship, in the long run leads to more opportunities to score.

His theory was never better exemplified than by the Argentinian futbol team in their match against Serbia-Montenegro. Watch this 22-pass play. The ball is finally touched in to the goal by Cambiasso, but the real beauty is in watching the team control the ball's movement down the field.

Posted by nicomachus at 9:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Italy won the World Cup, but thanks to the press building up the final match as Zinedine Zidane's swan song and their inability to wrap their minds around his senseless overtime headbutt, collective cognitive dissonance is all that remains. Few can stop talking about Zidane, but even fewer are saying anything.

Roger Cohen's "Camus and Zidane Offer Views on How Things End" is one of the better attempts at interpreting Zizou's headbutt. He concludes,

Zidane, it seems, lost his head. Or perhaps he kept his head and chose to write a coda to his story that would have all the complexity of a great novel. Perhaps he sought an almost unseen act of anger that would prompt a global, virtual argument about the merits or demerits of a gesture without sense.

This morning I received by email the following interpretation, which as of yet, is one of the best.

Zidane's headbutt, as seen by

the Germans

the French

the Italians

the United States

the press

Posted by nicomachus at 2:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

photo origin unknown

Posted by nicomachus at 12:47 PM | Permalink

In case you didn't see the relevance of that last post to a website that's primarily about cycling, this video should make it clearer.

Posted by nicomachus at 9:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

World Cup? Futbol? Soccer? What's all the excitement about anyway?

Ronaldinho, Carlos, Beckham, Zidane, Montella, etc.

Do you get it now?

For more on the World Cup, visit the official FIFA World Cup site or add Google's World Cup tracking module to your personalized homepage.

Posted by nicomachus at 1:45 PM | Permalink