Best World Cup Headline

From the Guardian:

Over-excited, overweight and over here

It's from an article about triumphalist fratboy US soccer fans over in Europe after our victorious, true grit draw with the Italians on Saturday, and it's a stinger. Here are a few highlights:

One doesn't wish to be uncharitable about our closest allies, particularly given the result, but if it takes a nation with the odd irksome football fan to know one, it seems reasonable to state there was a certain jarring tone about some of the US supporters who had travelled to watch their national team hold Italy to a feverish 1-1 draw.

"We'd like to be more like the English fans," one American visitor to Kaiserslauten's Fan Fest event explained on Saturday. "More crazy, you know?" Still, it's early days for the US game, with even the many college students parading down the town's main drag wearing Uncle Sam costumes having to concede it is currently either the sixth or seventh most popular sport in the US (debate centred on whether it is on the point of edging out hockey, and this correspondent's refusal to count Nascar as a sport).

[...]

In the build-up to the match, almost every American fan I spoke to predicted a US scoreline of "two to one", though the odds against being able to penetrate the thicket of unfamiliar soccer terminology were considerably longer. "I think it could be one to zero," cautioned a Pennsylvania student, Brian Goff, "because the Italians are really solid in de-fence. Really strong in D."

"Yes," agreed a Texan computer programmer, Casey Switter, "the Italians are shysty little assholes, so they'll probably dive in the box and get a PK."

It is perhaps not the most enormous surprise to learn that the fans were predominantly college students, in many cases naked but for board shorts and US flags, though the most popular costume was red, white and blue Mohican wigs. By 4pm, many were nearing levels of alcohol consumption worthy of their English role models, with one fan only just managing to avoid being flattened by a car after collapsing spectacularly into the road outside the stadium entrance (Mohawk down! Repeat, we have a Mohawk down!)

[...]

And as a nation not exactly hampered by chronic self-doubt, they had plenty of advice for the English game. "You have this crazy thing," observed Greg, "where, like, you, Scotland and Wales and Ireland have to play separately. You just don't marshal your resources properly. We can't understand it."

Well, we're not desperately federalist - but it's certainly something for us to consider for 2010. "Which, by the way, I'm hearing won't be in South Africa because of security concerns," Greg continued. "But they want to keep it in Africa, so it's going to be in Dubai."

And yet, tempting as the chance to play a World Cup in 40C heat undoubtedly is, it seemed fair to point out that Dubai is not technically in Africa.

"Come on! Close enough."

I was in South Korea with a couple friends back in 2002 and was privy to see three USA games (had I been told before the tournament that would have been the case, I would have been apoplectic; but, as it turned out, they were the surprise team of the tournament and very entertaining). And if there was one group of folks we always avoided, it was the USA supporters' group, Sam's Army. They were always boorishly fratty and frankly annoying with the USA USA USA shtick. C'mon - the Koreans sang rousing songs to the tune of Beethoven's 9th symphony, and all we can come up with is "USA!" ad infinitum. We will never be a soccer powerhouse until we get some good chants.