Once every four years it’s time for the biggest soccer event again: the World Cup of soccer. Many AEGEEans will be watching, which can also be done together in the Facebookgroup, but not all of them will be soccer fanatics in their daily life. Especially for those people, the AEGEEan has created a guide: how to survive the World Cup without soccer knowledge. Do you watch soccer because your friends and family are watching too, are you the one asking a lot of questions during the game or do you really only watch the European and World Cup games (and maybe not even all)? Then this guide is meant for you!
Before the game
The easiest way to deal with a lack of knowledge, is to find a group of friends or family who have the same (or even less) knowledge about soccer as you. This way, the walking soccer encyclopedia’s don’t have to get annoyed at your – in their eyes – dumb questions, and you don’t have to feel stupid, because in your carefully selected group nobody will know the name of all players on the field ánd the reserves. Who needs to, anyway? However, if you don’t know how many players are in a team normally and you therefore can’t find people who know less than you (likely to happen sadly), it might be good to look at some Soccer for Dummies pages, like this one.
Since World Cup matches are normally watched with a group of diverse people, the chances are high that you will still encounter a few ‘professionals’. Keep calm and read on, because we have some tips ready! First of all, look up some trivia facts about the World Cup or match of the night to impress your fellow fans with. Did you know that every time a South American country hosted the World Cup, the trophy went to a South American country too or that The Simpsons dedicated an episode to World Cup 2014? Neither did I, but now you do! The true soccer fans, who can name all the scores of the last twenty years, might already know this, but in general there will be some fun trivia facts you can impress people with, leading to them thinking that you do know something about soccer (and that’s a secret we will keep). Find more trivia here.
During the game
First of all, if you are planning to watch a match, it’s important to make sure you are wearing the right colors. Don’t be the Dutchie who shows up in red to the match Spain – Netherlands, because you will be disliked no matter how much carefully prepared knowledge you have to share. Once you are present, wearing the right kind of colors, there are two options to use during the game: ducktape or ‘fake it until you make it’. The first option doesn’t need much explanation, since it’s a simple matter of applying ducktape (preferably in your national colour too) to your face, and shutting up for the rest of the match. The second option is a combination of copying what the commentators, your friends (the ones with knowledge) and newspapers say, while screaming at the right moments. Rooting for the wrong team and wearing the wrong color are a close call, so make sure you know on what side your team is playing (and what color they are wearing) to prevent yourself getting killed.
After the game
Whether or not you have watched, if you want to keep the conversations going with your soccer loving friends it’s important to have some basic knowledge about the match. If you won’t miss your friends that much, you can always just book a holiday and come back after the finals, but if you do, it’s mostly important to know the score of the game. Luckily, Google is always there and looking up matches isn’t that hard (unless you need a course of Google for Dummies too, but then you probably wouldn’t be reading this guide either). Besides, it might also be helpful to have a memory of the highlights (watched live or not), which luckily FIFA has made a page for with videos, to be found here.
Is your head spinning with knowledge to gain? Don’t worry, most important about the World Cup is to have fun, watching the games with your friends and enjoying some nice drinks and food. Besides, at the end of the day people might just be happy that you are the one asking dumb questions, even if they roll their eyes, since at least that means they are smarter. If nothing works, you can always make people feel good about themselves and have another drink. Keep calm and watch soccer (even with a lack of knowledge).
Written by Svenja van der Tol, AEGEE-Nijmegen