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The Aesthetics of Football

Football, or ‘soccer’ as it is known in some corners of the world, is both the biggest global game—measured by the number of those playing in and watching the sport at various levels—and surely the largest sporting spectacle on earth. Last year the game lit up the months of June and July, when 32 qualified national teams out of 207 participating teams competed for the most prestigious prize in football—the World Cup. The tournament produced a string of memorable moments, both good and bad— from the infamous incident with Luis Suárez making a meal out of Italy’s Giorgio Chiellini, to the splendid Robin van Persie’s flying wonder goal against Spain in the group stages. The event provided surprises and shocks, such as Costa Rica (ranked 27th in the world at the time of the competition) almost making it into the semi-finals, while Brazil inexplicably imploded on home soil and were thrashed 7-1 by Germany. UK commentator and former international player Gary Lineker has famously described football as ‘a simple game: twenty-two men chase a ball for ninety minutes and at the end the Germans win.’ When the 2014 tournament finally came to completion, his witticism could be seen to bear more than a grain of truth. In footballing terms, 2015 kicked off with the African Cup of Nations in Equatorial Guinea and the AFC Asian Cup in Australia. The latter saw Australia finally grab the glory, while the former ended Ivory Coast’s prolonged African Cup misery in a dramatic shootout in which goalkeeper Boubcar Barry gave a master class in gamesmanship before stepping up to put away the decisive penalty. The football fixes this June and July are the Copa América in Chile and the Women’s World Cup in Canada. In addition, of course, most of FIFA’s member countries have their own annual national leagues and cup tournaments for club teams; each of the six confederations have their own yearly cup tournaments for club teams; and finally FIFA arranges a World Cup for club teams every year. Football’s offerings alone seem sufficient to fill a sporting calendar. Like any other sport, football is a multifaceted phenomenon fulfilling a variety of functions. This fact is nicely symbolized by the motto of the European club football powerhouse FC Barcelona: més que un club (more than a club). Of course, most sports and football clubs are more than a club. One of the editors’ own home clubs, IL Skrim, whose men’s football team lingers in the lower regions of level six in the Norwegian league pyramid, is also much more than a club. Not only is it a place to learn to play football and get the chance to play competitive football matches, it is also a place to grow up, to make friends, to ease (more or less gracefully) into young adulthood, and so on and so forth. Most sporting clubs, like IL Skrim, fulfil various functions.