Four hundred days. It feels like a milestone. It's 399 days in Russian time, so I'll be celebrating going under 400 days tomorrow. I have been doing this for about 595 consecutive days. I say 'about' because I decided to start a few days after the official 1000 day countdown. I think I started on day 995. I should tweet Fifa about it like the guy who recently tweeted KFC, asking how many re-tweets he needed to get free chicken nuggets for a year. That tweet went viral. Fifa could do with a silly, happy story as a distraction right now after the report I read today about what a mess Fifa are still in despite getting rid of Sepp Blatter and, supposedly, cleaning up all the corrupt elements.
That might be tomorrow's story. Right now I'm watching Toronto FC play Columbus Crew, in Ohio. It looks like a pretty nice evening. The players are in short sleeves and so are some of the fans. They wouldn't be here in Toronto. But the stadium is awash with rows and rows of empty seats. It's fair to say that in most sections there are a smattering of fans. And I think what better thing could there to be than sit and watch live football on a warm Spring evening in Columbus. The Cleveland Cavaliers are safely into the NBA Eastern Conference finals, awaiting opponents. And that's 2 hours away, anyway. And the Cleveland Indians baseball team are playing in Toronto tonight. So what are people doing, sitting at home watching experts on CNN dissect the latest America political controversy?
And there is supposed to be some (manufactured) rivalry between the two teams. They play for the Trillium Cup every season, awarded to the team that wins most points in the matches between the two teams. And TFC are the top team in the Eastern Conference now after 4 consecutive wins. All this is not enough to draw the fans in.
So I say it again: get out and watch football and argue and talk about it. It's good for you.
Columbus are winning 1-0 at half-time. They scored a penalty. Altidore missed one for TFC. Columbus' penalty was given because the TFC defender's tap on the shoulder caused the Columbus player to collapse like the Hulk had whacked him on the shoulder. "You can't do that in the penalty box, the ref will always give a penalty," the experts say. Bull, I say. You can tap a player on the shoulder in the centre circle and it won't be a foul. Altidore won a penalty because he the goalkeeper clipped his ankles after Altidore had gone around him. He stopped a definite goal. He gambled and he won, with a yellow card the only cost.
Real Madrid are in the Champions League final. For my opinion of what happened in their second leg against Atletico Madrid today, see yesterday's post. I didn't hear the result on the radio today but I wonder what the one line story would have been. "Real Madrid are in the Champions League final after losing 2-1 today." Figure that one out, hockey and baseball fans.
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