American soccer fans are generally excited about this year’s World Cup final between Spain and Argentina.
After all, who wouldn’t be? It’s the first time the #1 (Argentina) and #2 (Spain) ranked teams have faced off since FIFA instituted the ranking system in 1992.
However, there’s been another development, another discovery, if you will, that doesn’t sit quite as well with Americans, and it goes to the core of why soccer may never catch on in this country the way that FIFA and U.S. soccer officials so sincerely hope it does.
Americans have found out there’s a game for third place.
On Saturday, the day before Spain and Argentina battle it out in New Jersey for the only thing anyone in this tournament really cares about, France and England will clash in Miami in a winner-takes-all battle to determine who finishes third and who finishes fourth.
Why? Why would you have a game to determine who finishes third? That’s a damn good question that a lot of Americans find themselves asking.
“Wait, there is a 3rd place World Cup game? What kind of loser bulls*** is that? That’s gotta be the most demoralizing game of all time,” Barstool Sports President Dave Portnoy wrote.
“It’s basically the ‘at least you tried’ championship,’ one fan wrote.
“Americans would never accept this trash. Gold or nothing,” wrote another.
Part of the reason for the game is money.
Under FIFA rules, the third-place “winner” gets $29 million, the fourth-place winner gets $27 million, the eventual champion and runner-up get $50 million and $33 million, respectively.
However, overshadowing that little-known and even less cared-about fact is how this completely dumb and unnecessary game illustrates the difference in mindset between Americans and the rest of the world.
In America, we compete to win. As in, we compete to win it all.
Yes, we have second and third place finishers, but no one cares about them because they didn’t win. The very idea that a game would be held for someone actually to try to finish third is completely alien to the American psyche.
“Americans love a winner and will not tolerate a loser,” George C. Marshall said in the opening scene of the 1970 iconic movie, Patton. “Americans play to win all the time. I wouldn’t give a hoot in hell for a man who lost and laughed. That’s why Americans have never lost and will never lose a war, because the very thought of losing is hateful to America.”
If the thought of losing is hateful to Americans (and it is), then the thought of fighting for third must linger somewhere between loathing and contempt.
Many of the primary complaints Americans have about soccer have nothing to do with the game at all. Instead, it’s about the culture of the game, or the way it’s officiated.
Americans are not okay with games ending in a tie. They’re not alright with guys faking injuries and flinging themselves to the ground in agony and being rewarded for it. Nor do they think it’s okay to call a penalty on someone and ban them for the remainder of the current game and the entirety of the next game.
Not all these things can be fixed. Some of them are parts of the game, and the majority European and South American organizations that oversee the sport won’t budge on them.
And that’s fine. Soccer isn’t for everyone.
But maybe, just maybe, they could split the money evenly between the two teams and not have a “bullsh*t” game to decide the third and fourth place loser.