Soccer is Called Football

So with soccer news: the league we play in is on a point system. If you win you get three points and you lose you get no points, if you draw or tie both teams get one point. G42, my team, is “that team” in the league that everybody loves to hate. Many of the team’s practice witchcraft and perform a spell called “Mhutsi” and they get a witchdoctor and do the whole shebang. But basically all the teams curse G42 and also pay the referees off to call the game against us. There is a fight at every game; I don’t mean a yelling fight either. The Black Aces is the team that is going to win the league lucky are friends with us. The team that wins the league is going to move up from Division 1 (the league we play in) to Super League, the league below Premiere where its shown on TV. But the Black Aces are made up of night security guards and all the Super League games are played at night, under the lights in big fancy stadiums. So they won’t be able to move up and they have offered my team the Super League position of finish the season in second place. We are in about fourth place now, so that means every game is crucial.

There are four games left in the season and when the Black Aces gave us their proposition there were seven games. Since then we have won 2 and last Saturday’s game was insane, I don’t really know how to conclude it, we didn’t win and we didn’t lose and we didn’t tie. This game is one of the toughest and most crucial to win of all the games left to play. I didn’t play I had some gnarly stomach issues going on and I said it’d probably be best for the team if I didn’t play because we really had to win. The team we played is very good and beat us 2-0 last time we played them. One of the linesmen was paid off against us, he was making ridiculous off sides calls and just being bluntly horrible and one sided. Luckily though, he was on the line where my team and all our fans were sitting, so in siSwati and English, they tore into this guy and ripped him a new one. Screaming and yelling at him and the absurd calls he was making, I even chimed in a bit myself…But anyways, we were leading for most of the game so the bad calls got worse and our opponents capitalized off of those bad calls and gained two points on us. Then the uproar really came, everybody was up and yelling and freaking out on this ref, all the fans  from both teams were yelling at each other, I mean this isn’t really anything new either. Game play stopped because Mapile, the team captain, was protesting to the main ref the goals that they had just scored because they were illegal,  all while everyone was going nuts. The crappy line man who was paid off couldn’t take all the heat on his neck and probably feared for his life according to how often angry fans beat bad refs like piranhas on a limp chicken, so he threw his flag in the air and walked away. According to the Lubombo Region National Football Association, if a referee leaves during the game, the game can no longer continue. So it looks like we will have a re-match.

I’m the only white guy in the whole league. Actually in all the leagues, from Division 2 to Division 1 to Super League and probably the Premiere league and National Team. Which is kind of cool because, I’m slightly famous, random people come up to me and ask how I played in the last game, others tell me they saw me play, and just all that kind of jazz. It’s just crazy too me. I don’t even really believe I’m good at football, but they think so. But I know that there is no way that I am playing on a professional soccer team and only learned how to play in 3 months, and it happened just because I am that good. No way, no way it was my own power or athletic ability.  God gave me the drive to get practice all day long, just juggling a ball. He just made me good enough. I guess God has tricked the minds of Swazi’s to believe that I am decent enough to compete, ha. But me playing on the team has been more than just playing. It’s been a way for God to work is the lives of the guys I’m playing with. That’s how after 3 months I’m a professional soccer player, just by God, nothing I did.