I felt cheated with the World cup!

I am sure so did many out of the estimated billion who saw the event. While I am not a fan of football (soccer for some!) I did watch some of the matches!

Surely sports we see today can no more be defined as; 'A sport is commonly defined as an organized, competitive, and skillful physical activity requiring commitment and fair play.' (wikipedia.)

I stopped watching NBA a few years ago when the game, especially when it could have been the most interesting last few minutes, turned into a farce. It is all about how many fouls each player 'had to give' and deliberately foul. This is supposed to be a clever strategy as there was a possibility that the fouled player would miss a free throw. Also as a player of the game I could never get used to extra step the NBA pros are allowed to take!

Anyway coming back to world cup I was happy to see this sensible comment made:
Mike Ingham
BBC chief football correspondent

The good news is that Spain are the champions and worthy champions, but the bad news is the biggest match in the world was soiled and stained and betrayed by the Netherlands.
I know part of football is to stop your opponent, but you must do it legitimately and I don't really see the point of getting to the final if you're going to disrespect it like the Dutch did so crudely. It was a bit like watching a child trying to build a sandcastle and another child then knocking it down.
I think Fifa has a problem because they trumpet this ideal of "my game is fair play" but if you think about this World Cup we had France qualifying through cheating, Uruguay denying Africa's best team [Ghana] through cheating and the Dutch last night with their own slogan - my game is unfair play.

The game is all about 'Natak' (drama!) and as the correspondent observes 'cheating' now! To foul and not be caught. To distract the referee by any means. Pretend to be injured! Grab the opposing player and make him ineffective and so on! I am sure someone would have already suggested academy awards for the best acting for injury and the most clever foul in soccer matches!
There are many instances but the last minute goal disallowed by the referee and that Ghana was forced to take a penalty kick was totally disgusting as it was a very clear victory for Ghana! I wished that with the number of blunders the referees had made they could have made one decision which was morally correct. I also had feeling that the ball had crossed the posts!

One has to see the hair line width decisions made by machines in Tennis to declare a ball in! I would not even comment about golf where the player is expected to honest and being caught would mean a disqualification!

My memory goes back to the sixties when I watched Matunga Athletic play in Bombay and have good memories of the game! They played a very clean game and were a pleasure to watch! The team was made up of educated college kids and they were likened to breath of fresh air in the game by the lovers of football!

I guess I should mention my cousin Prasad and Anantram and others who were the main reason I would go all the way from Pune to watch them play!

Then I checked about the rules of the game and this is what I read: Since soccer sparks some pretty intense competition at times, playing it without a lot of strict rules and without a referee to enforce them caused serious troubles in mid 19^th century England. Soccer fights became something that was seen as normal and they gave the game an aura of violence that in truth it didn't deserve. (http://www.soccer-fans-info.com/soccer-rules.html)

Surely things have not changed much since then!