I love soccer. I love the sport. I love the passion for the game that we lack in the States. Honestly, it's like our passion for every professional sport focused into one dynamic slugfest for global supremacy. It's like a life long love affair this far south. Armando and Renato (My host brothers) invited me to play with their club team Sunday. The game started at 4 PM, and although we were all a little worn down from the night before (patience people! one story at a time!), I dug out my Deportiva Cuenca jersey (1 national championship), and threw down some old school futbol. It was one hell of a match.
We met up with our team at an abandoned schoolhouse in downtown Quito. In the gym there was a book fair taking place, a drained pool covered by a worn, corrugated plastic roof laying beside the school. Our cement court was occupied by another team, so we warmed up in a brick enclosed, weed ridden field for the first 45 minutes.
Peruvians kicass. Enough said. I'm no Wayne Rooney by any means, but you don't see me tripping over a soccer ball. These guys though, they were fierce. Lions on the futbol field. I could hardly get a ball past them. Peruvian futbol is fast, and on a concrete court it's even faster. Back and forth for ninety minutes, trading off playing goalie, I have never been so frustrated with the game in my life. But it was awesome. Even the average Peruvian can handle a soccer ball like a champ. In the end I garnered one lousy assist.
It was fun though.
1 comment:
60 year olds - you probably get your money's worth (all that experience and none of the demand). Makes more sense to me than spending $5,000 per lay like Eliot Spitzer. Have you heard about this yet, Erik? Spitzer Swallows Gate has eclipsed pretty much all news of the ongoing primary elections. Sad.
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