If you wish to win the World Cup, you must first invent the universe. Nobody thought to ask him, but if Carl Sagan was asked how to play soccer he might have said that. Boundless existence, creation, destruction, morality, entropy, a sphere touched perfectly so that it bends to make straight lines unnecessary, 22 humans meeting in a rectangle and interpreting it so that its shape doesn’t matter. These are all different organs, appendages, celestial bodies, and other unconfined vessels that contain an objective reality but reach well beyond what’s known and seen. Seemingly separate, they are a part of the same body as every part of the universe that has existed or will exist. In short, soccer explains the universe.
Time doesn’t even matter. A clock has 90 minutes ticking up but time is a loose concept and matches may very well go on well beyond that, for 4 minutes and 32 seconds even, there’s no way to know how long a game of soccer will last because time is an invention and 90 minutes stretches on well after the clock reaches that mark.
Soccer is more than a game, it is the product of consequences of something else that goes beyond a goal coming from a few moves that lead to the ball being in the net. This is displayed spectacularly by the really special and memorable moments that the game engenders. The Mano de Dios goal by Diego Maradona comes to mind, saying that the only hand that touched the ball was God’s may have been spoken by the deity itself. That he could overcome gravity, that el árbitro didn’t seem to notice that his hand turned into his head, and that it created a moment where Argentina got one over on England – D10S may well have been right, a relationship between reality and a guiding spirit must have reached down to touch that moment.
As far as frameworks for understanding the universe it doesn’t seem like soccer has much to add to that conversation. Under USMNT manager Mauricio Pochettino those ideas may grab hold on the field and beyond it.
The elements that come together and break apart in a constant dance of creation and re-creation that nudge existence into being also nudge soccer into the valley of a discernible yet imperceptible force. Pochettino has described this concept himself as Energía Universal (Universal Energy en ingles). A Guardian article noted that the concept is something like “a guiding power, a life force that influences everything. It feels appropriate to consider the Butterfly Effect, which advances the possibility that small causes can have momentous effects, and there is an obvious spiritual dimension to it.”
A USMNT with a spiritual dimension sounds like a team that could grow into its potential and become bigger than itself. Afterall, there is something bigger about soccer than the fact that it’s just a game. It’s also the most popular sport in the world that draws in billions of people to watch a single game on television and brings entire cities, nations even, to a standstill for significant matches. It’s truly a universal language and people across the globe can experience an event, even one happening on a different day, at the same time.
The new USMNT manager described the idea further saying, ‘“I believe in energía universal,” Pochettino said. “It is connected. Nothing happens for causality. It is always a consequence [of something else]. Maybe, it is one of the reasons that Harry [Kane] always scores in derbies. I believe in that energy. For me, it exists.”’ Poch’s task now is to combine the elements he has to invent a universe where that energy is harnessed and creates a life force with the momentous effects that create the unbelievable.
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