Cup Fever

It’s the biggest game on earth, and it’s hard not to get into the action. Unless you’re an American, and all the games start at 8 am on Tuesday.

As with every World Cup, the 2006 field has some amazing human interest stories. The diversity of nations participating in the World Cup make it easy to get swept away by a favorite team’s culture or history. But no story is grabbing more highlights and talk time this year than the Ivory Coast, a small West African nation that made its first World Cup appearance despite being home to a host of world class players, including Chelsea striker Didier Drogba.

What makes Ivory Coast’s appearance so spectacular is not the impressive side they have this Cup, nor the heartache of having been seeded with soccer giants like Holland and Argentina. All the attention given the Ivory Coast because this World Cup appearance has led to the first truce ever called in the nation’s bloody, three year civil war (making it all the more ironic that the fierce competition in their round robin seeding earned it the nickname “The Group of Death").

Sportscasters and pundits alike are quick to credit the spirit of The Beautiful Game with granting reprieve to a war–torn nation. But the truce begs a question that belies such a high order of absurdity that it’s hard to ask: if soccer can inspire a feeling of common aspiration strong enough to cease the war temporarily, why can’t the future or your nation and its children inspire you seek a peaceful solution to your problems? (I know, I know. “Fuck you hippy, it doesn’t work that way.”)

Even if football does lead to a temporary realization of our aspirations to harmony, it does well for us to remember that, as always, peaceful ambitions are secondary. In the real world, it’s still dog-eat-dog, and the complexity of problems leave us feeling apathetic. After all, neither Argentina, Holland, nor their fans had any difficulty celebrating wins that would surely lead to an earlier re-start of Ivory Coast hostilities. The Ivory Coast was sent home early, proving, at the very least, that the fact that a few million Africans can’t get it together isn’t enough to cause anyone involved to throw the game and ruin their own World Cup aspirations. Not that anyone living a nation as tough as the Ivory Coast wants our pity points, I suppose.