LA Weekly

I don't know how large a goal (i.e., the space between the two posts and bar) actually is, but it's clear that goalkeepers, not to mention players in general, have been getting bigger and fitter for years. And the more important the game, the stingier the defense and the harder it is for strikers to actually squeeze the ball past a goalkeeper. Thus soccer, despite a profusion of great goalscorers, becomes a metaphor for impotence. The four quarterfinal matches netted a grand total of six goals, three of them coming courtesy of Italy's convincing 3-0 win over a gallant but obviously outmatched Ukrainian side that had all too obviously reached its level of incompetence. In the meantime, England-Portugal was 0-0, Argentina-Germany was 1-1, and France-Brazil, despite Zinedine Zidane's wonderful master class in midfield, came down to a single goal from a free kick and nothing from open play.

One could fiddle endlessly with soccer's strictures (loosen the offside rule, allow more substitutions, etc.), but one obvious change has been staring the sport in the face for decades now: MAKE THE GOALS BIGGER! If you simply added a foot in width and six inches in height to the goalmouth, balls that now skim the bar would go in, as would every shot that hits a post (of which there's almost always at least one a game) or whistles inches past. Shots that have virtually disappeared from the sport -- the artful chip over the goalie from distance, for example -- would enjoy a renaissance, and attacking tactics would be rewarded far more than they are now. True, there are teams -- Ghana's performance against Brazil comes to mind -- that would have trouble scoring even if you installed a goal the size of a WalMart, and presumably England will miss penalties until the end of time, but a lot of matches that now feature one goal, or none at all, would regularly boast several. Nothing essential about the sport would be changed, and enlarging the space between the posts and bar would certainly not amount to vulgar "Americanization," about which the footballing world is absurdly paranoid. All that would happen is that creative players would be rewarded for their efforts much more often, and inspired forwards like Wayne Rooney would have less reason to be enraged and frustrated by a sport that perversely hands an overwhelming advantage to the forces of negativity.

-- Brendan Bernhard

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