Jacksonville needs a Soccer Team again. It is Time Guys?
Patrick Lockyer
October 18, 2009
I do miss soccer and get to see some online. My American wife dutifully watched some of the 2006 games in pubs in New York with me and in Mexican restaurants here in Jacksonville. Soccer in the UK is very tribal and I lived in the East side of London and supported West Ham. They have a very tight ground and I only got to go to a live match a few times. I remember paying some kids to watch the car and being just feet from the opposing player taking the throw. One of the congenialities was to insult and put off the player best you could. This player was called Conroy I remember right back to the 60´s and he had very skinny legs. The chant therefore was "Conroy is a wanker". Appertaining to his perverse actions?
I half watched the TV game of USC versus Notre Dame. There was a shot from the back of the stadium that clearly showed that a fan could see nothing of the play and was merely there to make up the number and get informed post action and to be able purely to say they attended the event. Going to a Cup Final is quite an event in the UK and I only went once. I watched on TV many many times though and it was always cause for a party. Watching a World Cup game was just an extra level. I feel sorry for Americans in not having that same awesome lift. Just a few words about the Cup Final at Wembley. I had lived at Wembley as a soldier based at Regents Park Bks. I would commute by train. We had a celeb right there on the main street in ´Henry Cooper´. He and his brother had a fruiterers and grocers. He had stuck one on Muhammad Ali one time and was the pride of West London. I never got to Wembley then but much later joined the men folk of my sweetheart to support Sunderland, a soccer city of the highest order. They eat, sleep and drink soccer 24/7. They have a new awesome stadium called ´The stadium of Light´. We were the Peterborough contingent of the Sunderland Supporters Club and met at a family home in Wembley. We all walked the mile or two to the famous stadium and we were placed behind the goal. It was all terraced standing at that time and we were all squashed in. It was like being part of a seething slimy live object. We could just about see where the play was even if not pick out the ball. We moved constantly and whereas my two closest friends/family were one to the front left and one to the rear right of me it was constantly changing. Now I was in front of the other two and they had changed sides of me. I wondered whether we would ever find each other afterwards in this capacity crowd. Some of the heavy drinkers went to the back wall I was informed to urinate in rolled up newspapers. It took too long to line up at the bathroom apparently and would miss too much action. Suffice to say that I never bothered to endure that grade of fanaticism again. I got ´brownie points´ in the family though.
I have tried my best to find a similar level of excitement in NFL or college but it is damn hard work. I Ho Hum as a kicker comes on and misses and sits back down? A time out with 30 seconds left? Taking a knee? I have seen one or two good games that held my attention but they are few and far between. I deduce that a good left handed thrower like Tebow can take the US world by storm and with an equally good catcher the game is about won. Conclude that to transfer those two to the other side and the results would alter accordingly? To an outsider here eight years that does not pan out to be a well thought out game strategy? Could that be why no other nation in any seriousness plays the game? Going to a stadium for four hours itself is pure torture somedays I am sure and especially for the kids? A period of four hours just watching on TV is somewhat unproductive and wasteful to me but good for the advertisers I suppose? I know that it is pure sedition to knock the national game at all but why the USA cannot adopt and embrace the ´world´ game is beyond me. It is not for no reason that over 200 nations drool over soccer from above and below the states. Of course Canada is not a prime nation for the sport with its climate but all nations below the USA live and die for soccer games and soccer success.
What makes the game hugely successful in the UK is supporting your home town. I had the honor of introducing video to my home town of Peterborough. I was a driving instructor and had lived there a few years and had become interested in video. It was a huge contraption I first bought. The recorder was a small suitcase thing and the camera the size of a large loaf of bread. I did a few video weddings for next to nothing and watched my team play from my season ticket seat. Then at one game two players were in a scuffle. Our player was an ex policeman. They were to be suspended but the visiting team had made a video that showed no blows were landed. I wrote to my team´s manager and asked if he would like me to document the games for the same reason. He said ´yes please´. I just videoed from my seat but it turned out that someone complained about it being hard to see over my camera. Thence forward I was invited to film from the managers private box he had had built about five layers up from the touch line.
I had now struck gold. I had publicity. I was the video man. I had access to the higher echelon. I could go anywhere in the ground. I was hailed in the players bar. I taught the players to drive and got even more publicity. I filmed their weddings. I got mentioned in the match program and in the local press. I ended up with a huge camera filming from the roof gantry. I went on to film for King Hussein and Lady Palmer and ´The East of England Show´ with and attendance of 200,000. I travelled the country doing weddings.
Back to soccer though, supporting West Ham has been from birth. They are not the most successful team but are true to themselves. Supporting London teams comes next. Arsenal and Chelsea in the EUFA cup or Champions League Cup. If a London club beats a top Italian or German or Spanish team it is a feather in your cap. They are all great soccer nations. That is on a ´cities´ level. London versus Madrid.
An entirely different level though is nation against nation. You know that England could have a stronger side were it to amalgamate the Welsh, Scots & N. Ireland players but pride just will not allow that ever. England has to provide a squad of home growns to compete with far bigger soccer nations and much more athletic backgrounds. Brazil is considered the epitome of soccer excellence and without a doubt their climate and interest and athleticism lead to amazing individual ball skills. Of course that may not be all that success on the field relies on and Brazils reliance on Pele did not go well for them in England in 1966. Maybe the European style was too much to overcome. Germany and England and Portugal were the major players then. I think that in Africa the weather will once again favor a European side.
My actual point in writing though was in wishing to encourage the Jacksonville populace to once more or for the first time to experience the beautiful game played at high tempo for ninety minutes and with a passion not really seen in any other American sport. No time outs. No standing around. No replays. No beer adverts. No diverted attention from the action on the field. You have to love soccer to truly enjoy it. You have to catch your breath at the man with only the goalie to beat being robbed at the last second by the awesomely timed sliding tackle that takes the ball to safety without incurring a foul? You have to sigh at the ball sent 40 yards to the corner flag to your winger and beyond the defender? The fingertip saves. The brainwork in using tactics to draw the defensive team out. The interesting commentary.
There are Englishmen who don´t know soccer, don´t get me wrong. I was filming for my team at a very important match and alongside me was a National TV cameraman. Usually with a big camera you need ´swing room´ or ´pan room´. There was a shot on goal, the goalie got a fingernail to it and it went out for a corner ball. I was ready. The other camera panned for ´crowd reaction´ and missed the quick taken corner kick and subsequent goal? I had never missed a goal scored at my clubs ground in about six years and there was this BBC guy not getting the only goal of the match. You may think you know soccer I say?
What would it take to have a Jacksonville soccer team? Maybe play where the Rugby Axemen do? I know that my ex Peterborough Manager Noel Cantwell tried to raise interest in soccer here once and it did not work out. They were the Jax Tea Men in the 80's. This might be the time to try again? There will be huge world interest next June and July and that would help get it off the ground. I have been enthralled as a soccer lover just at Losco Park to see Latino´s playing skins v shirts, without referee and linesmen and at ninety miles an hour. I have seen skills incredible just in the Local Park and end to end stuff. Ninety minutes of great entertainment.
I have recently been diagnosed with a stage 4 colon cancer. I have been in an immigration process for eight years and have had to be frugal. I was lucky to have had just one month of cover in 2002 when I had a biliruben issue which I assumed was from drinking bad water whilst spending time on a sail boat in a failing marriage. Extra scrutiny over 9/11 added extra stresses to that marriage. I spent one week in hospital in the only month I had insurance cover from 2001 when I arrived in the states until I married my wife Barbara in May 2007. My wife is a RN at Blue Cross Blue Shield. We have insurance right now.
I had nine days in Jacksonville Baptist Hospital in August 09 and had a colectomy surgery. I am now in my second month of chemotherapy. My treatment consists of a five hour visit to the chemo lab every second week. It actually takes about six hours all told just sitting in a lazy boy and reading or dozing. When the infusion has completed I am fitted with a pump to continue the chemo infusion for two more days. The pump fits into a fannie pack or bum bag as we say in the UK. My side affects after three sessions are that I cannot drink ice drinks or touch cold things and that my appetite is affected. It seems that the best time for eating and enjoying food is the five or six days before the next chemo visit.
I have lost about 30lbs and have no pain. I am confident that I can cope with the treatments and I have been told that I have a strong constitution. I am keen to get the chemo done and have four months more to go. There will be more surgery if the mass is reduced enough to remove or radiate. I am hoping to be able to travel and see London once more and especially I am keen to enjoy the upcoming World Cup in Africa. Another thing I am hoping to witness is the London Olympics in 2012.
A Jacksonville soccer team would also be a dream as there really is no more exciting game ever invented that for ninety minutes swings back and fore and cannot be presumed and where the underdog can always ´pull it off´ one time. I videoed the cup match where lowly Peterborough United beat the great team of Liverpool. Just filming that match was awesome but my instinct also led me to take position behind the Liverpool goal when the professionals were all behind our goal. We scored somehow and I made a fortune selling the video with ´We are the Champions´ overlaying the goal that won us the game.