The Boston Globe has a small item up today that most North American soccer fans would have read before. The circumstances will have been slightly different, but someone, somewhere writes a Soccer Has Arrived article every couple of years.
What's interesting (and I use the word loosely) is the comments section below the article. If you've ever taken a look at reader feedback below 99 per cent of soccer articles posted in US publications you'll find a curious phenomena of non-soccer fans yelling at soccer fans about how stupid/gay/un-American/sissy/evil soccer is. It's a truly spectacular display of ignorance, racism and homophobia.
Soccer fans don't help the situation through their attempts to "debate" with the guy that felt compelled to write about the "dirty fa---t foreigner that isn't a real athlete like a real American offensive lineman."
It's all a bit pointless.
[PRBREAK][/PRBREAK]
As are the articles. Of course soccer has arrived. It's been here for more than a hundred years. The debate, such as it is, is whether soccer has broken through to the mainstream and is on the cusp of being treated the same way as football, baseball, basketball and hockey in the traditional sports media.
Who cares? The sport is growing in popularity just fine without that attention and it will keep growing to the point that it will demand it.
So, the next time you, the soccer fan, see a Has Soccer Arrived article do yourself a favour. Skip it. Instead, go read anyone of the thousands of publications that covers the sport now.
The Canadian Soccer News is a good option.