Men's Soccer Whiners Can Learn From the World Cup Women

Listen up, male soccer-actor! Watch the women play. You will see the beautiful game. The women play, you act. The women fight, you pose.
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Watching the World Cup from Germany and you have to wonder, is this really soccer? Where are the fake dives and the bleating? There was no pouting star writhing on the ground as if the merchant of agony had chosen the poor victim to be the model in his shop window. No highly paid tumbleweeds spinning across the field at the suggestion of contact -- boo-hoo-hoo, that hurt, where's my mommy? No cry baby whiners. No men anywhere. (Ignore the aberrant Brazilian stretcher bounder in the quarter-final, she learned that from her male compatriot, Barcelona's Dani Alves.)

The mojo of men's soccer has shriveled. Watching male stars faking hurt is a cheap deception like buying a knocked off Versace handbag from a dodgy purveyor of crap. The hard sell of soccer has produced some of the most brittle divas and their ouch-grouches; a slap in the face to so-called masculinity and an insult to the noble tradition of amateur dramatics. This me-centered illusion has hurt the men's game in many ways. The papers are filled with players saying, I don't want to play for $100,000 a week, I want double that! You can hear their plastic spoons banging on their highchairs. The soccer press is loaded with screeching levels of talk about gossip and grudge, scandal and frivolity. It puts a budgerigar convention to shame.

Of course, not every male player acts like a brat, most abhor these pathetic shenanigans. There are even humble superstars -- Messi and Beckham pop to mind. So, how can the flaccid soccer man's mojo be restored? Abuse from the fans and press and even the yellow card have been met with deaf ears. Perhaps it is time for the collective will of the modest majority of players to have a whisper in the ears of the prima-donnas but don't get too close as they might fall over. Maybe yelling at them would be better. Scare them to death.

Listen up, male soccer-actor! Watch the women play. You will see the beautiful game. The women play, you act. The women fight, you pose. The women gather, you head back to the changing room to blow-dry the hair on your toes. Wake up, man! Look in the mirror! Maybe not, on second thought. Where's my hairspray?

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