Ashes to Ashes

[Grizzly]

What we need is the English Football team playing the Italian Rugby Union Team!

Trefor I dont think that Gerrard et al would be much of a match for Castrogiavanni, Parisse and Bergamasco. Although I would like to see it just to see John Terry wet his pants.

[mookien]

As a largely ignorant non-soccer fan, I have two questions:

1. Why play a game for 90 minutes to a tie, and then settle the tie by playing a different game (penalty kicks)?

2. Why not go back to the Golden Goal rule, whereby (if I understand it correctly) the next team to score a goal is declared the winner? At least it is the same game.

In the past to settle ties, the U.S. NFL used sudden death (an analog to the Golden Goal, I believe), but abandoned that and now plays overtime periods, albeit under slightly different scoring rules, to determine the winner. But, at least they play the same game.

Please enlighten me. Thank you.

John

[linedrive]

My friend and I were having a similar conversation in that we preferred the golden goal... We thought, just let them play, but every 15 minutes, remove a player. Evenuallty (with no score), let the goalies have at it.
... Line

[mookien]

Line: Thanks. Your suggestion sounds more "reasonable" (satisfying?) to me than penalty kicks.

Somehow, I think at the bottom of this question lies economics. If the teams play on, nobody makes any more money than they already have made by the end of regulation. On average overtime play would almost certainly utilize more air time than simply having the teams do penalty kicks. But, not being a soccer fan, I just don't know.

John

[Deirachel]

What befuddles me is these fine specimens of English sporting prowess, these peak professional athletes, whose service to the glorious game apparently justifies wages of hundreds of thousands of pounds a week... each!... Were mostly walking at seventy minutes and could barely manage more than a gentle jog. More effort required me thinks.

Edit: Or perhaps performance related pay.

Football/soccer doesn't hold the monopoly on the ridiculous salaries to play a game.

American Football have at least 6 players making $30 million/£24.08 million a year in base salary alone.

For example: Payton Manning
$32.5 million for a 17 week season.... $1.911 million a week (£1.228 million a week)

And, they only play approximately half the game (as either offense or defense) and have a brief breather between each play (plus T.V. time outs, regular timeouts, stoppage of play for calls). This doesn't include the bonuses for making the playoffs, making the Super Bowl, or winning the Super Bowl. Or, the endorsement contracts.

The average teacher in the US? $43,668/£28,069 per annum. Hmmmm.


Edit: Tie-breaking in Football/soccer is different depending on the League and level of the game. In FIFA, it's two 15 min periods and if no one wins, then it's a tie. In the World Cup it's two 15 min periods and then the penalty shootout. I'm not sure of the rules in question for the Scotland/England game.

[mookien]

Football/soccer doesn't hold the monopoly on the ridiculous salaries to play a game. ...

Edit: Tie-breaking in Football/soccer is different depending on the League and level of the game. In FIFA, it's two 15 min periods and if no one wins, then it's a tie. In the World Cup it's two 15 min periods and then the penalty shootout. I'm not sure of the rules in question for the Scotland/England game.

Thanks for the clarification on how ties are resolved at the different levels. As for the high salaries, it obviously pays to be a celebrity entertainer. Another example is the money payed to actors/actresses.