Lucia

de Vernai

Read Lucia's bio and previous columns

June 19, 2008

Understand Sports, Understand the Geopolitical World

The smack talk of the NBA playoffs and Kobe Bryant dropping “the s-bomb” on live television is entertaining. Bandwagon jersey purchases build unity, and the price of commercials during game five gives hope to the economy. And nothing gives the American sports experience that prime-time flavor like some heart string-tugging words from a coach.

Los Angeles Lakers coach Phil Jackson cancelled practice after his team “had their hearts ripped out.” Don’t be surprised if, the next time they step on the court, it will be to the sound of a hundred tiny violins. Meanwhile, across the eastern pond, Europeans are living out their own sports dramas as national soccer teams act out their frustrations from immigration policy, EU agricultural subsidies and a century or two of broken treaties in the Euro Cup 2008.

Case in point is the German victory over Poland, 2-1, in one of the first games of the tournament. A Polish radio station reported that economists calculated the affect of the loss on the morale of the Polish population. It turns out that overall productivity went down 20 percent, costing the country billions of zlotych. An outsider may point to the fact that the Germans have the only team that has won the Cup three times and is likely to make the fourth a charm as well. Good sportsmanship requires that the loser take the outcome graciously.

That certainly holds true when, before the game, we all sing the national anthem to the same flag – one that the guys on the other side of the field didn’t try to erase from existence. The East Side versus West Side rivalry in the U.S., which got the knucklehead who wore a Boston Celtics jersey in L.A. his 15 seconds of fame on YouTube, is intense for us too.

The Cup competitors from the East Side of Europe (that’s the polite way of saying from behind the Iron Curtain) have emerged as forces to be reckoned with. Croatia’s victory over Germany is more than a change in the usual betting pools. It’s an assertion of visibility and a changing balance of power in Europe – at least symbolically.

Soccer remains the European currency not distributed along the lines of natural resources, political alliances or economy. The stakes will be high if Portugal or Croatia faces Germany in the playoffs. As millions of Europeans rooting for the underdog watch, waiting for Germany’s holy trinity of Klose, Podolski and Gomez to slip up, there won’t be any room for sympathy. If the political underdogs like Greece or Croatia are able to successfully stand up to Germany or Spain, the sweet taste of victory will belong to more than just the home teams.

Just like every Virginian who hates the Lakers or New Yorker who would rather keel over dead than watch another Boston team win a championship, sometimes true allegiance has little to do with where you live. Often, the pride of victory has more to do with who cried in the locker room than who took home the trophy. Now that’s good sportsmanship.

Click here to talk to our writers and editors about this column and others in our discussion forum.

To e-mail feedback about this column, click here. If you enjoy this writer's work, please contact your local newspapers editors and ask them to carry it.