Because my pontificating friends (Art, SV, KT, what happened, guys?) who set up this blog with the intention of filing "serious posts" have failed utterly, I'm taking over The Screaming Vulcan and turning it into someting considerably more fun: a blog de futbol. I'm not changing the blog's name. No one can dispute that futbol gives one lots to scream about. Even robots get excited about it.


A bit about my futbol/football/soccer resume: I'm an American who played organized soccer for twelve years, mostly on "select" teams on the east coast, and in high school, where I was captain. I played center and right mid.

I attended Stanford for undergrad, where I did not play varsity, but kept up playing in intramural and pickup games. I moved onto Harvard Law and then Manhattan after Stanford, and my post-collegiate futbol career exlusively consisted of hoisting pints while cheering the pros on TV. NYC is a great town to watch futbol in bars.

I have religiously watched the World Cup since 1994, and have watched various Champions League and EPL games sporadically from the late 90s through today. (I have tried many times to watch MLS, but just can't get into it.) I recently moved into a place that, for the first time, supplied me with the Fox Soccer Channel. I've been watching FSC as much as possible and am thrilled to finally be able to follow, regularly, the EPL and European club soccer. I don't yet have a team -- more on that below.

Because the only games I could regularly watch in the past were World Cup games, I've never regularly followed a European league and have no allegiance to any club. Essentially I've only followed individual players in the past, identifying a few WC favorites and then making an effort to watch their club games in between Cups. With FSC at my disposal, I aim to pick a team this year.

Perhaps because of my own playing experience, I am most impressed with midfielders, and will almost certainly choose a team with a quality midfield. Like many, my favorite player over the last decade was Zidane, who is the best and most elegant soccer player I've ever seen play full matches. The 2006 quarterfinal performance against Brazil was so inspired that it almost brought me to tears. I am so sorry to see him go.

So far, I've really enjoyed the Chelsea, Milan, and Liverpool matches FSC replays, with my favorite players in those games being Joe Cole, Pirlo, and Steven Gerrard.

That's all for now.

FF