Comments on: Every Soccer Pleasure Negated

By: Pablo Morales

Pablo Morales — Fri, 08 Jun 2007 02:17:37 +0000

Really love your blog!!
New to the blogging world and in need of traffic, would really like a link exchange.
Thank you!
Pablo.

By: Anthony Ellis

Anthony Ellis — Sun, 02 Jul 2006 14:59:54 +0000

Marcelo Balboa surely needs the use of my glasses,also the referee that failed to call foul on the the two Portugese players trying to butcher Rooney prior to his sending off. It’s no wonder Rooney stood on somebodies family jewels, there was nowhere else to put his feet. In my opinion poor commentary thoughout the game and poor judgement by the ref for thar particular incident

By: No_one

No_one — Sun, 02 Jul 2006 00:08:53 +0000

ESPN, I beg of you, PLEASE PLEASE sack your entire soccer analyst crew. Dave (I will mispronounce every city, player, team I talk about) O’Brien and Marcelo (I am the world’s biggest douche bag) Balboa are beyond terrible, they are criminally incompetent.

JP Dellacamera and John Harkes aren’t nearly as cringe-inducing as Balboa and O’Brien but they still suck.

If you couldn’t find real commentators why didn’t you just use your Champions League crew of Tommy Smyth and Derek Rae?

Seriously, soccer in America will never get a chance if you continue to use these guys.

(And Eric Wynalda is just a daft prick who needs to be beaten up by small children – please send him packing)

FIRE FIRE FIRE these clueless twits.

By: Lars

Lars — Tue, 27 Jun 2006 11:15:18 +0000

The worst football commentary I ever heard in my life. Iwouldwatch in chinese rather than watching these silly clueless commentators.

By: Football-Fan

Football-Fan — Sat, 24 Jun 2006 11:58:15 +0000

If this O’brien guy is a baseball guy, what business does he have doing play by play football. I find that strange, you hire people who know the game. As for Wynalda and lalas, I am really disapointed in them, sore losers at times their comments reminds me of the school yard bullying style. You can tell they are not good journalists and are not good communicators, even their comments hen asked question sounds like a child who doesn’t what he’s talking about. Shame on them I expected more from them, but once you rub shoulders the O’briens you’ll become them. I am also sick and tired whenever the camera comes back to the studio, the anchor mentions wynalda being the higest goal scorer in the us history. Fine we’ve heard that, how many times do we need to hear it. The funny part wynalda is enjoying, as if that makes him better than todyas players. He should’ve told him to stop saying that everytime, but that shos us who are our hosts isn’t it. Lets start an independant channel for soccer only, by fans like us and hire the best in the world on such occasions.

By: kamic peace

kamic peace — Fri, 23 Jun 2006 04:07:38 +0000

These American football commentators (yes its football not soccer) are driving me nuttttttts. Can we please do something about getting ESPN to get the Tommy Smith and Healy team to commentate on the crucial matches from the second round onwards. The art of football commentating is a beauutiful one and these guys covering the matches for ESPN/ABC is killing that thrill.

I dont even know where to begin, their reading and understanding of the game is totallly pooor, and even the guys like Balboa, and other ex American players who are in that commentating team, can’t commentate properly.

Further these guys would rather blabber on about something thats totally unrelated than give a play by play. In most cases the play by play guy only gives the play by play for the known famous guyts when they are touching the ball or passing, thats not commentating you idiots. Ahhhhhhhhhhh Crazyyyyyyyyy

By: C13

C13 — Tue, 20 Jun 2006 03:03:58 +0000

Who else is annoyed at the amount of times Balboa says as a result of a miscue by an attacker in front of goal: “Oh, I’m sure he’d like to have that one back. The look on his face says he’d like to have it back.”

And why can’t these clowns pronounce players’ names properly? There something about listening to the Spanish announcers’ foreign pronunciation, but the ABC/ESPN coverage just lacks the overall ability to pronounce names comfortably…even after a dozen times. (How many times during the Argentina/Ivory Coast or France/Korea match did the commentators have to refer to a player as “Korean defender”) And did anyone else hear them referring to the Ghanian team as “Ghanans?”

And someone, please spare us from the biggest fairy of them all- Shep Messing. Certainly someone in the corporate suites has to have noticed the miscast- his awkward jibe, sloppy delivery, and senseless ramble coupled with sound effects “BAM!”- for a shot preceding a goal. Or “PKKKKKKK!!!” as an attempt to emphasize the fact that neutral football viewers eventually have something exciting to look forward to with the possibility of a goal. (ArrghhhH!!)

Has it always been this bad???

By: Richard

Richard — Sun, 18 Jun 2006 22:39:46 +0000

As much as I am annoyed by the announcers talking about other matches during the one that is played (normally about the USA), I think the ABC coverage is better than on ESPN, mainly due to there not being an irrelevant news ticker at the bottom of the screen and the use of obnoxious screen covering graphics is minimal and the score bar is right at the top of the screen!
Watching the Italy v USA game yesterday, I have to say I think O’Brien and Balboa are getting better – by no means perfect and Balboa’s views on situations seem ridiculous at times, but something was less irritating about them.

Watching ABC’s coverage right now, I’m not liking this old timer heading the studio team – I don’t know his name. He really comes across as having zero football knowledge prior to the World Cup and is just reading off a teleprompter with no personal views whatsoever. Why not have Alexi or Eric Wynalda chair it? Also, why don’t they analyse the games? After the Croatia Japan match, the chair guy said something like we’ll be back to analyse this match and they come back after the break and they spend all of 1 minute tops on it then its all about Brazil and USA again! And why is Joulie Foudy in Chicago too? She’s not great at analysis (or isn’t given the opportunity, like Alexi and Eric too), but she does know the sport.

Oh, and after the Italy USA game, anyone with eyes and/or ears would agree that there was plenty of incident to talk about in that match. Analysis after the game? No, an episode of Cheers instead…..?!

I actually found Univision in my cable package and I was shocked to see how much better the picture quality is on that channel over ABC’s/ESPN’s picture. I’d think it was just signal issues in my region but I’ve read a lot of posts around the net saying this. Also, there’s bugger all on the screen except the score. How good does it look!? ESPN/ABC should be a bit ashamed at this, or is there a technical reason they can’t control as to why their picture is inferior? They have the money, surely more than Univision, but they are beaten. Spanish speaking folks have it made. I do not… maybe if I put two tv’s together, one for sound, one for picture…

By: ABC sucks

ABC sucks — Sat, 17 Jun 2006 23:43:05 +0000

I cant believe watching a language I don’t understand is actually much better than listening to these fools in English. Does it make sense to talk about a game that has not even started yet, i.e. USA v. Italy, during another match? They should be fired.

By: Richard

Richard — Sat, 17 Jun 2006 04:35:21 +0000

Looking at what O’Brien said to USA TOday again…
” So O’Brien, calling Germany-Poland today, wonders if he should “spend even 15 seconds describing what the Bundesliga is?” (Ja: It’s a German soccer league.) “Should I explain what (soccer governing body) FIFA is? My 11-year-old daughter doesn’t know. If I do that, the clique will say I don’t know soccer. But we’re putting on a TV product, not a soccer clinic.” ”

Looking at the end of this paragraph, O’Brien contradicts himself.
If you do the explanations of football fundamentals, you are putting on a ’soccer clinic’. Dumbass.

To quote a comment on another footballing forum;
“It isn’t good for anyone. It’s annoying for the knowledgeable fans and misinforming for the casual fan.”
‘Bout sums up most of the ESPN World Cup coverage for me.