On The Ball with Mark Wheat: Great Sayings in Soccer

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January 21, 2014

daniel sturridge liverpool — Daniel Sturridge scores for Liverpool on Saturday as the first half versus Aston Villa nears its close -- setting in motion events to prove the axiom that indeed "it is a game of two halves."
Getty Images via BBC Sport Facebook page

On the Ball with Mark Wheat is a new Monday feature on The Current that celebrates the connections between music and soccer, with an eye to the past weekend's results. Listen Mondays at 7 p.m. as Mark plays the music selection of the week.

As predictions go, I am batting a thousand this season in the NFL! Micah, my regular cashier at the supermarket on the Sunday morning-paper run asked me, "As a non-expert, who do you think will win the big playoff games today?"

"Denver and Seattle," I shot right back, eliciting high-fives for going against the Patriots.

"They're like the Manchester United of the NFL," he added a little caustically, even though he purports to support the Red Devils!

Later on Sunday, I was "as sick as a parrot" about the United vs. Chelsea game, and thought ... Wow we've been doing this blog for months now, and haven't talked about football clichés yet!? Apparently no one knows where the parrot one comes from,
although I have sneaking suspicion it was generated by the Monty Python parrot sketch.

Chelsea v Manchester United highlights (via NBC Sports)

Another common cliché that came to mind as I watched the Saturday games was, "It's a game of two halves." This suggests that the game can look radically different and the results of each half can be diametrically opposed to each other. That played out in all three games:

In the first half of Sunderland at home to Southampton, the visitors played great, some of the best passing and movement I've seen from a NON-Top 4 club, going into a two-goal lead before Sunderland had a shot on goal. Eventually the home team recovered to draw 2-2, perhaps due to the manager Gus Poyet's team talk at half time, but even he admitted, "We need to be realistic, this is a point gained because we were far from being good enough in the first half. It is incredible how much we changed in the second half."

Sunderland v Southampton highlights (via NBC Sports)

Fulham's manager Rene Meulensteen thought, as I did, that his team played well in the first 45 minutes at Arsenal: "If we produced a bit more quality we could have nicked a goal in the first half, but we will take a lot of heart from this performance." Then the Gunners turned up the power in the second half to run out comfortable 2-0 winners. Fulham's first half AWAY performance was even more surprising when you remember that they lost 4-1 at HOME to the struggling Sunderland last week. "What a difference a week makes" is another oft-used cliché!

Arsenal v Fulham highlights (via NBC Sports)

The most striking example, however, was the third NBCSN Saturday game at Liverpool — who in the first half looked unable to stop Aston Villa (predicted in OTB to go down this year). Liverpool went two behind as well. Then Sturridge grabbed one back for Liverpool right before half time. Another cliché — that that's a very bad time to concede a goal — was proven true. The Reds equalized right after the interval, albeit through another dubious penalty awarded to Suarez. But then they really they should have gone on to win, Villa never looked as good as they did in the first 40 minutes.

Liverpool v Aston Villa highlights (via NBC Sports)

I was off-air for MLK Day on Monday, so it's appropriate to celebrate another Liverpool hero who has worked hard to help banish racism from the game: John Barnes played throughout the 80s, most notably for Liverpool and England. At that time, I didn't follow the game from over here. It was harder to do before the Internet and American TV coverage, but it was also because I was disappointed that hooliganism and racism were a regular part of the game. Bananas were thrown from the terraces at black players back then. Rio Ferdinand of Man Utd has been outspoken more recently about the racism that still exists on the pitch, but he remembers being inspired by seeing John Barnes back-heeling one of those bananas:

"He was one of the first players of his generation who was willing to make a stand. There were a lot of black players who just got on with it because they had to put up with it. John was always of the opinion he didn't have to put up with it. He always spoke out saying it was society's problem not just football's."

Enjoy the silky skills of an important black player in English Football History, in this John Barnes highlight reel:

One of the first multi-racial bands that I was exposed to in the late '70s were The Specials. Although perhaps best known worldwide for their support in song of Nelson Mandela, the lyrics to this one are just as important: