The world game
I do love the World Cup. I’m talking football here, by the way, which will no doubt immediately propitiate the non-chess readers. The concept of a truly world game bringing the globe together in a celebration of culture, tradition and general bonhomie is really something, And I’ve spent many a late night over the past few weeks glued to the screen as the drama, excitement and history unfolds.
But I have, naturally, a few comments to make.
First of all, you do have to be a little crazy, a little bit of a fanatic, to be able to watch ninety minutes of passing with a very real possibility of not witnessing a single goal. Have you ever tried switching between channels when there are other sports on? It just doesn’t work. I tried watching a Cup game after the rugby league State of Origin finished, and it was just painful. It was incredibly difficult to go from a high-energy, intense sport where dramatic action presents itself every two minutes, to the more complex patience of soccer.
Don’t get me wrong: I appreciate fully that soccer is an incredibly complicated, tactical game, in much the same way that chess is. In fact, I think that’s part of its downfall in this regard. Just as the more naïve spectators are more likely to enjoy watching poker on television than chess, soccer has a hard time competing with other, more action-packed sports in front of a generic, non-affiliated television audience.
Naturally this is an over-simplification, and there are a number of other factors which explain why soccer doesn’t share the same popularity issues that chess faces with the general public. For one, soccer is heavily ingrained into the cultures of many nations – for some, it’s seen as a way of life, of domestic tradition, rather than just a game. Another reason is that it’s far easier for the layperson to understand what’s happening in a soccer game, who’s winning, who’s losing, and to understand the commentary, than to comprehend the shifting tides of a chess game.
Still, chess should be able to claim the same position on the world stage as football. It deserves more in the arena of public opinion. We deserve a World Cup of chess with the same level of attention, flamboyance and vuvuzelas as this one. At the very lease, we need the same level of Australian support – after all, as opposed to soccer, at least Australian chess is on the up, right?
Twenty-20 chess, anyone?
How good would it be if during the Olympiad, supporters were allowed to play vuvuzelas, players were escorted to their boards by supermodels (Sale of the Century style)!! We could give the arbiters more power and allow them to suspend players for the remainder of the current game and the next one if they get unlucky and fall for a simple tactic in time trouble, or get overly agressive in a losing position trying to get some counterplay. Oh and of course, the appeals board would have to be a bunch of spineless twits who decide to uphold every decision a referee makes during the game.
If only our fearless leader from Kalmykhia spent more time coming up with innovative ideas (or hell, stealing them from your blog) and less time telling people how he believes that martians exist and that animals have the same level of feelings, intellect and emotional connections that humans do, Chess would certainly take the world by storm!
Actually, do you think we can convince people these ideas would be good for the Zonal? I reckon theres a chance I will play on the top few boards in an early round and would like to be brought to the board by Ms. North Island, as long as she doesn’t talk… I hate bleating.