Silliest but also the nicest.... You have to admit though.... you sort of do a double take when one of your (American) friends uses a British term.... My cohost say "bloody" all the time now... as if it has always been part of the LA vernacular.... The American commentator on Fox used "shambolic" a few weeks back.. a mere 4 days after the Englisg dude from the phone in show said it...That was strange.... Cheers Simon Allen World Soccer Wrap
Simply because one commentator uses one of these terms one or twice, does not mean they are in the standard vocabulary of the game in the US. The only terms with significant use that I have heard are, Shots "On Frame", Shot in the "Upper Ninety", He/She's a "Southpaw", and They "Match Up" pretty well with the other team or there are lot of interesting "Match Ups" out there. The remaining terms may be colorful but really are not in general use.
Exactly. I'm sure we could gather a handful of Sky broadcasts, sit down with pen and paper, and assemble a list of colorful one-off "phrases" drawn from stuff commentators say. Whether American or British, they're just individuals using language to describe things for two hours a stretch. I don't mind the "commentator-speak" being highlighted in a newspaper or on a TV program. But call them what they are: colorful phrases that popped out of some announcer's mouth somewhere. Implying that they're part of the American soccer vocabulary is just spreading misinformation. I know it doesn't hurt anybody ... but it's still misinformation!
What it really comes down to is that the English don't realize we're not their colony anymore (if anything they're our colony in a cultural and military sense), so we're not required to copy every little thing they do and say. Remind every person that tells you "it's football, not soccer" this point. If you want to call it football, that's your right. But don't even attempt to correct me when I call it soccer.
what it really comes down to is that some people find it amusing. I've never quite understood why people seem to believe any kind of criticism, however mild, is down to some deep-rooted resentment. Is it completely fair? No. But it's just a light-hearted piece highlighted things people have heard. for balance, have England's own Ron Atkinson, who's probably invented more phrases than Shakespeare, but to slightly less acclaim. http://www.dangerhere.com/ronglish.htm
Holy crap the article was a HUMOR PIECE stolen from a tongue-in-cheek MLS highlight show. No one is telling us how to speak, it was simply a humor piece, jesus.
Found this classic: "Looks like we have 5,000 Chuck Mangione's in the stadium tonight" (in reference to all the horns) - Max Bretos
As a Brit I completely agree with you. In fact, there isn't really a problem understanding your commentators, even if it's a term we've not heard before most of the stuff is easy to understand. Unless of course you're a tabloid journalist or a dizzy TV presenter.
exactly... but what the eff is a stone???? Oss.... good to see u posting again... but i still hate Reading!!!
I could really care less what brits find funny or what ever. most are just ignorant because we aren't the big powerhouse they are when it comes to soccer. fact of the matter is that if our best athletes played soccer we would destroy them. unfortunately we are only slightly behind them and thats with our players being the 3 or 4th best athletes in general.
Blimey, this has caused something of a storm! I'm one of the producers on the UK version of "David Beckham's Soccer USA" and one of our viewers picked up this thread and sent it to us over the weekend, and having read all of your comments I thought I'd address a few of them. Yes, the terms mentioned in The Sun (give or take the odd typo) were sourced from our show as we've used them in our "glossary" item over the past few weeks. No, we don't think that these are regular terms (apart from terms like "Upper 90" or "PK" which seem to be fairly widespread), it's just a bit of fun. Someone earlier in the thread mentioned Ron Atkinson who is well known in the UK (amongst other things) for introducing his own phrases into his analysis and commentary, and on our old show Soccer AM we even managed to get manager Iain Dowie's made-up word "bouncebackability" put in the dictionary...we celebrate those as well. OK we're calling the item a "guide to U.S. commentary" but we wouldn't expect anyone to believe that every U.S. soccer fan lives and breathes these terms. The item (and the show itself) is a sideways look at MLS. It is meant to celebrate the fun and entertainment of soccer/football. The fact that our subject matter is MLS is irrelevant because we took exactly the same stance for 10 years on Soccer AM with football from the Premiership, Football League, La Liga and Champions League. We are football fans making a show for football fans. Believe me, we're not the sort of people to patronise a league or a nation's fans, and we're certainly not taking a superior attitude...we're just having fun. Two of us watch every minute of every game every week in MLS which means we're doing our best to pick the best bits of action every week. We show every goal (not just the goal, but the build-up), the best skills, funnies, and also provide the odd bit of information. If you haven't seen it, you can find the weekly links on the MLS News and Analysis section of this forum, or on YouTube, or there's a Facebook group (David Beckham's Soccer USA Group of Facebook) which a fan set up. I'd be interested to hear your feedback via soccerusa@five.tv Thanks for listening and I hope to hear from some of you in the future. Neil
So it turns out it was just a laugh, as most of you understood. We also laugh at ourselves and I believe you also laugh at us... no problem, it's humour. I believe I saw some American comedian criticising us all for speaking like the Queen, I can't remember crying about that, in fact it was pretty funny. I can't remember thinking you were trying to exert some reverse psychology colonial rule over us either!! Let's not fall out about this.
the fact is that if you add tuna mayonaisse to a baked potato, perhaps with a bit of cheese, it'll be more tasty. That isn't really relevant, but I was just following your lead.
Especially, if you olive oil and oversalt the skin before baking in a hot oven sans the oft used foil.
Thanks for the explanation. And thanks for the show -- it's kick-ass. Have you thought about creating your own website/video host where you can air the program without being at the mercy of YouTube's iffy video quality and erratic organization?
Beckham's British Fans Baffled By US Commentators Why do they care? I thought MLS was a minor league? Now they want to listen to our games?
Re: Beckham's British Fans Baffled By US Commentators I saw how they tested fans on Soccer USA. They approach them on the street, interview them and quiz them about certain American terms without any context or prompting whatsoever. It's very Jay Leno-esque and it's funny, actually, but I wouldn't take the results very seriously. If you do, you're a moron.
Re: Beckham's British Fans Baffled By US Commentators I know the sub-forum is rubbish, but that doesn't mean we should have another thread on this article here.