First World? Hahaha...

I know an overwhelming number of my blog entries are about or allude to soccer, but i can't help it, thats just me. I consider it a privilege that i get to play, watch and talk so much about soccer, because my current lifestyle allows me to do so. 'All good things come to an end', they say, so i'll never know how long this'll last. I know futebol is always going to be a part of me, but i may not get the chance to express that part of me my whole life. I'm not good enough to be a professional player, and refereeing sucks; so i guess the next best thing is to write about it, professionally, someday. Just gotta keep working on that.

As i was playing under the ridiculously perfect-for-soccer weather today, a couple of 'men-in-blue'/ ' the home team/ 'dear Mr Policeman'/ Cops approached our court of play. Same ol' routine, done it umpteenth times, give the ICs/ 11-Bs (one joker gave an ezy-link card..), listen to the very badly executed lecture, and stop playing, cursing the arsehole who lodged the complaint of course. Your name doesn't go in any official record, its just unofficial paper-pushing.

Some cops are understanding, they play the game too, so they'll tell us they have to do their job cos someone lodged a complaint. Some really mean it and warn us. The cop from today was very affable and understanding, he even let us play on, just at a lower volume. I think that makes much more sense than a cop who would've gone by the book. Stop us playing at this particular place and we'll just go to another place, inevitable. Using common sense works better than just blindly following the law sometimes. The law is not meant to be followed, contrary to popular opinion, but meant to be applied.

"Do this kind of thing how to qualify for World Cup?" is the most common gripe among players. Goal 2010 is down in the stinking dumps. One of MM 'Eminem' Lee Kuan Yew's well-known memoirs is titled 'From Third World To First', but i think that's misleading. Singapore can be considered economically first-world, but no way is it an all-round first world nation. There are many other reasons why i think that is so, but my point here is that Singapore lacks a 'Sporting Identity', not restricted to just soccer. Domains like politics and economics are of course important constituents to qualifying for such a label, but a Sporting Identity is needed to complement that.

There's been a call from the Gahmen that for Singapore to have really made it, we not only need to be world-class, but recognised as world-class. My JC Literature teacher once told us that 'it's not about what you know, but how you show it'. Visibility is terribly important for recognition, and a Sporting Identity can give that.

You want to be seen worldwide? Where better than in the world of Sports?! Sauber Petronas and Alex Yoong(for awhile) in Formula One put Malaysia on the map.Similarly Narain Karthikayen for India. For China, the 2008 Beijing Games. USA - Michael Jordan (basketball), Lance Armstrong (cycling) Tiger Woods(golf). Vijay Singh(Fiji). Dwight Yorke and Trinidad & Tobago in the World Cup. The English Premier League for England. Alexander Popov (swimming) and Maria Sharapova(tennis) for Russia. Haile Gebreselassie and Hicham El Guerrouj (running) for Ethiopia and Morocco.

This is just a tip of the iceberg, and the profiles of the nations vary from rich and powerful, to up and coming, to struggling third-world. But a niche in Sport has put them in the map somewhere and aided their cause. The closest spore equivalent would be Li Jiawei at world no.3 in table tennis.And we've had a few Silat world champions. But more needs to be done. The gahmen needs to up the ante - the sporting administraion in spore is abhorrable. There is sporting talent among us, no doubt, but an inadequate sporting culture. And until there is a better sporting culture here, we'll just be first-world - economically. C'mon, that doesn't sound cool at all.

And i got all this to say just because of a 5 minute interruption to my soccer session.