Cheap Seats
What, no riot?
After spending up to $775 on a four-day trip to Estonia, Scotland’s frustrated soccer fans trooped home last week after seeing 3 seconds of action.
Their team’s World Cup opponents, Estonia, didn’t show, and the game was abandoned in a near-empty stadium as soon as Scotland had formally kicked off.
“I think you can say they are angry and upset,” said Willie McDougall, security adviser to the Scottish Football Association. “Although many had flown to Estonia, some had spent two days going by ferry and overland by car.”
Estonia’s no-show protested FIFA’s agreement to Scotland’s request to stage the game almost 4 hours earlier so it would be completed in daylight. After the Scots and the game officials had left, Estonia fans began arriving and so did the team. About 4,000 Estonian fans had bought tickets for an evening game.
“We are not playing the games only for FIFA but for the spectators,” said Mart Tarmak of the Estonian Soccer Association.
The funny thing is, the teams played at different times and still wound up in a scoreless tie.
What’s he running, a convent?
University of Nebraska football coach Tom Osborne has warned his players to stay away from casinos in neighboring states.
“Because gambling and college athletics don’t mix,” Osborne said, “we’ve warned our players to stay away and to my knowledge, they have not been back.”
Casino gambling is not allowed in Nebraska, but some surrounding states have riverboat casinos or casino-type games. Nebraska horse-racing and keno operators unsuccessfully tried to put proposed constitutional amendments for expanded gambling on the Nov. 5 state ballot.
Osborne said he generally has had pleasant experiences with Nebraska football fans, but “the occasional truly negative experience I have usually involves a fan who has lost a bet on Nebraska football.
“Those of use who are concerned about the quality of life in Nebraska will hopefully oppose all attempts to increase gambling activity in our state,” Osborne said.
Damn right. Keep out those evil gamblers and bring in more upstanding, quality-of-life types like Lawrence Phillips.
The real theory of relativity
Count Jay Leno among those amused at the recent furor over golfer Tiger Woods - who, the week before he won his first professional tournament, pulled out of another event and cited exhaustion.
“Now, when you’re exhausted from golf, how do you recover?” wondered The Tonight Show host. “What’s more relaxing than golf? That would be a coma.”
Square peg, round ball
It’s incongruous to Tim Keown of the San Francisco Chronicle that former Princeton basketball coach Pete Carril is now an assistant coach with the Sacramento Kings.
“Carril is the anti-NBA,” Keown wrote. “He’s the anti-scholarship, anti-cheat, anti-playground, anti-selfish coach who always sat on the bench looking like he was about to pass a stone. The man is as collegiate as a bluebook.”
The last word …
“He is part human being, part total eclipse of the sun.”
- Bruce Keidan, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, on Ohio State’s 6-foot-6, 330-pound Orlando Pace
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