2 SPORTS REVIEW BY SEAN CALLAHAN
rennial soccer tournament’s final game on TV — more than those who tuned in to the NBA playoffs that year. Soccer is growing in the United States, especially because ours is one of only seven national teams to have qualified for all of the last six World Cups. And right now there is little chance of escaping talk about it— even in the United States.
THE ESPN WORLD CUP COMPANION Everything You Need to Know About the Planet’s Biggest Sports Event By David Hirshey and Roger Bennett Ballantine/ESPN. 251 pp. $30
“The ESPN World Cup Companion” can help you join the conversation. This coffee -table book provides a lighthearted but thorough look at the tournament, which was first held in Uruguay in 1930. On al- most every page, the book digs up a nug- get of soccer history gold. For example, authors David Hirshey and Roger Bennett tell us that Brazil won its first World Cup in 1958 in Sweden after undergoing exten- sive preparations, including the extrac- tion of “more than 300 teeth . . . from 33 players, who had never been to a dentist.” Pelé, playing in his first World Cup at 17, also may have been a factor. The authors identify cult figures, such as England’s Nobby Stiles, a midfielder who helped the team win the 1966 World Cup and who “spooked opponents merely by re- moving his dentures before a game.” And they select the winner of their “World Coif- fure Cup”: Carlos Valderrama, who sported a blondish Afro for Colombia in 1990.
A BEAUTIFUL GAME The World’s Greatest Players and How Soccer Changed Their Lives By Tom Watt
HarperOne. 211 pp. $29.99 Tom Watt’s “A Beautiful Game” features
reflections on soccer by England’s David Beckham, Argentina’s Lionel Messi and other soccer stars. These remembrances are accompanied by striking photos of chil- dren playing soccer. (UNICEF receives 5 percent of the book’s revenues.) Among the best photographs: a shot of children in In- dia playing the game on a dried mud field, cracked like a jigsaw puzzle. Most of the players’ reflections are prosaic. Some, how- ever, offer real emotion: “Until I was ten, I didn’t have any [soccer cleats] but then my dad bought me a pair,” recalls Mahamadou Diarra of Mali. “I was so happy that I slept cuddling them for the next two days.”
The passion — and politics — of soccer D
uring the most recent edi- tion of the World Cup in 2006, 16.9 million Amer- icans watched the quad-
IAN WALTON / GETTY IMAGES Oguchi Onyewu of the United States and John Terry of England jump for the ball in the June 12 game between the two countries.
AFRICA UNITED Soccer, Passion, Politics, and the First World Cup in Africa By Steve Bloomfield Harper Perennial. 299 pp. Paperback, $14.99
“Africa United” delves deeply into Afri- can soccer. Steve Bloomfield writes that South Africa’s World Cup “is an opportu- nity to shine a light on the new Africa. The continent that is constantly viewed through the prism of war, poverty and dis- ease will get a chance to present a differ- ent face.” In this engaging book, Bloomfield duti- fully describes how the Internet, mobile phones and increasing urbanization have boosted Africa’s economic power — a de- velopment rarely reported in the West. But some of his stories undercut his the- sis, reinforcing the notion that Africa is weighed down with burdens, even if soc- cer can sometimes lighten the load. For instance, Bloomfield shows how soccer helped speed the reunification of Ivory Coast in 2007, which had split between north and south during a five-year civil war. At the time, soccer star Didier Drog- ba, who is from the south, eased the rec- onciliation when he declared that he wanted Ivory Coast to play its upcoming World Cup qualifier in the northern half of the country. “It will be the victory for Ivory Coast soccer, the victory of the Ivory Coast people and, quite simply, there will be peace,” Drogba said.
CHASING THE GAME
SOCCER EMPIRE The World Cup and the Future of France By Laurent Dubois Univ. of California. 329 pp. $27.50
In his incisive, if at times overwritten, “Soccer Empire,” history professor Lau- rent Dubois explores how France’s self- image and colonial history are inter- twined with Les Bleus, the national team. France triumphed in the 1998 World Cup thanks in large part to two goals in the semifinal by Lilian Thuram, who had been born in the French Antilles, and two mag- nificent headers in the final by Zinedine Zidane, whose parents were Algerian im- migrants to France. Many believed that the Cup victory by this integrated team of blacks, whites and Arabs “showed France what it could be: . . . a nation that gained strength from its diversity.” Eight years later, when France returned to the World Cup finals, the result was a heartbreaking loss to Italy, exacerbated by Zidane’s ejection for head-butting an op- ponent. The international incident gave renewed voice to Jean-Marie Le Pen and his far-right Front National’s disdain for immigration. “Ciao voyou! (Bye-bye, hoodlum!),” read the headline of one far- right publication.
America and the Quest for the World Cup By Filip Bondy
Da Capo. 312 pp. $26 Unlike Les Bleus, the U.S. soccer team
doesn’t carry the weight of the nation. In fact, it doesn’t even have a nickname. But expectations are growing for the Amer- ican team. In “Chasing the Game,” Filip Bondy shows how the U.S. team may be able to make a run — with a little luck — deep into the tournament. In the 2009 Confederations Cup, the United States showed flashes of brilliance in defeating Spain, one of the top teams in the world, 2-0 in the semi-final. Then, miraculously, the United States led mighty Brazil by two goals in the final, only to collapse in the second half, losing 3-2. While the score was close, Brazil showed it remained at least a cut above American soccer. “You have no idea what they’re going to do until they actually do it,” U.S. goalkeeper Tim Howard said. The same can be said of the U.S. team.
No one knows whether this squad can make a run to the World Cup quarterfi- nals as the team did in 2002 or will flame out as it did in 2006. But no matter what happens, it’s a safe bet that more Amer- icans than ever will be watching.
bookworld@washpost.com Sean Callahan is an editor at Crain Communications and author of “A is for Ara,” for children.
THE WASHINGTON POST • BOOK WORLD • SUNDAY, JUNE 20, 2010
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140 |
Page 141 |
Page 142 |
Page 143 |
Page 144 |
Page 145 |
Page 146 |
Page 147 |
Page 148 |
Page 149 |
Page 150 |
Page 151 |
Page 152 |
Page 153 |
Page 154 |
Page 155 |
Page 156 |
Page 157 |
Page 158 |
Page 159 |
Page 160 |
Page 161 |
Page 162 |
Page 163 |
Page 164 |
Page 165 |
Page 166 |
Page 167 |
Page 168 |
Page 169 |
Page 170