The sport effect

I watched this youtube clip of Zinedine Zidane and I realised more than ever why football is called 'the beautiful game'. I also realised that rap/hiphop music in French sounds 'tres' cool. Zidane is such a treat to watch. His control over the ball is sheer poetry. Unfortunately most people who don't follow football probably remember him for his infamous headbutt - strange word that, which brings us to the bad pun of the day section: "Anyone who says that they can't make ends meet should be given a headbutt". Now that we have that done with, I was saying that most people who don't follow football probably remember him as the guy who headbutted the Italian player in the finals of the world cup 2006. Unfortunately France lost the match in the penalty shoot-out later on and almost every person who could voice an opinion and had the medium to do so, blamed Zidane for the loss. Not many bothered to find out why he had done it and what did Matterazzi say that provoked him so much. The details of the incident surfaced many weeks later. If what this news article says is true, it started with a shirt tug, which was met by sarcasm from
Zidane, which proceeded on to Materazzi mentioning his preference for Zidane's sister over his shirt in rather colourful terms and finally ended with the infamous headbutt. Anyway, the headbutt just shifted focus from what was an end to a glorious career which mesmerised audiences all over the world. Zizou was one of the greatest that the game ever had.

Watching sportsmen who are brilliant at what they do is like watching artistes practising their art. You wish you could do it, but lesser mortals know they can't and so you just appreciate the beauty of it all. I get the exact same feeling when I watch cricket and the batsmen are batting brilliantly or the bowlers are bowling beautifully. Watching batsmen like Sachin Tendulkar just blows you away. Just the thought of how, when a moving ball is being hurled at them at around the 85-100 mph mark, batsmen like him can decide in the split of a second whether to step forward and shift their weight to the front foot, or step back and shift their weight to the back foot, depending on where the ball pitches and then hit the ball taking into consideration the lateral movement of the ball is mind-boggling. Watching great bowlers bowl also gives me that same tingly feeling all over. There is nothing more spectacular than the ball crashing into the wickets of a batsman. Even better if the ball is a 'yorker' and the batsman is 'yorked and bowled'.

I have often wondered what it is about sport that makes people, especially men so passionate. What is it that it makes me want to wake up at 6 am on Sunday and play cricket. I am very sure there is nothing else I will wake up voluntarily for at that unearthly hour. What is it about sports that prompts us to do crazy things like running around in the streets and celebrating after a win or just sulking at home after a loss - maybe even shed a tear or two. I could never figure out how a grown man could cry on account of some game being telecast on the televsion until that crazy India-Australia match in 1992. India were in a hopeless situation and they rallied to almost win and lose and then win and finally lose the game in the last ball that was bowled. People who have seen that world cup match should know what I mean by win,lose,win and finally lose, all in the last ball. I jumped up for joy and celebrated twice in that one ball only to have my happiness cruelly crushed. I was in shock. It was just a game but I had that feeling which could probably be described as something you may feel when everything you have owned and wanted has been taken away in one instant by fate and there is no way you can get it back. I was almost in tears and slightly ashamed about it too and that's when I looked at my brother and my cousin brother. Both of them were sitting silently on the sofa, eyes moist. My brother was 20 at that time and my cousin was 27.

There are so many people who suffer heart attacks watching the games - especially during the cricket and soccer world-cups. I have a feeling that in a few decades, I may become one of them. Even now if the game is thrilling, I get that queasy hollow feeling in my stomach and I can't bear the tension. I have realised though that this only happens when I am watching the game and and not when I am playing it. Probably because I know that I am helpless in changing the course of the game if I am merely watching. On the other hand if I am playing, I know I have a chance. I think I may have control issues.

My wife tells me that she read an article sometime ago in some newspaper a while ago that the movies that men are most likely to cry during are sports movies or patriotic movies. Actually if you ask me, playing the best moments of a game in slow motion with good slow music also works very well.

So ladies, promise to look the other way when you see us men crying at games and we will promise not to look at you when someone close to you is getting married or when Meryl Streep and Clint Eastwood are next to each other at the traffic lights in The Bridges of Madison County.