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There was a great tableau on television the other day when Cristiano Ronaldo asserted himself in the European soccer tournament.
A two-man jury of his peers – Eusebio and Luis Figo – was seen celebrating the goal that would put Portugal into the semifinals. My friend Rob Hughes described Ronaldo’s match so well in the International Herald Tribune and New York Times. Figo was leaping into the air as befits a Galactico of the past decade, whereas Eusebio was more earthbound as befitting a deity of the ‘60’s. They have given and suffered in public. Now it is Ronaldo’s turn. By sheer talent and burning will, Ronaldo has become the dominant player – perhaps the only dominant one – of the current Euros. You cannot take your eyes off him. Italy plays as a unit with masterful passing but no finishing. It controlled the ball for over 60 per cent of Sunday's scoreless quarterfinal with England and had to win it in a shootout. Germany, which beat plucky Greece on Friday, is a force, free and inventive enough, but depending on a system. Spain, going for an unprecedented third straight major championship, depends on brilliant players fitting into a balletic order. The short precise passes were beautiful to watch on Saturday during the 2-0 dismantling of France. The great correspondent Jere Longman writes that Spain is falling short of the high expectations it set. It's hard to tell from the tube, but that's why Jere is there, to get the feel on the ground: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/24/sports/soccer/euro-2012-critics-point-to-the-flaws-in-spains-art.html Italy and England, the two old men of the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, came into the Euros refitted with old parts and new parts. New parts contributed two of the most inventive goals of the tournament so far – Danny Welbeck’s backheel flick of a goal for England, Mario Balotelli’s powerful backward cannonball for Italy while out-wrestling an Irish defender. Welbeck and Balotelli are part of the changing face of European football, black men in a formerly mostly-white world. Both were in the starting lineups Sunday as their clubs figured out how much they needed them in the knockout quarterfinal match between England and Italy. . Balotelli, greeted by an unusual display of warmth from his Premiership colleagues in the pre-game handshake line, was a tower of frustrated strength, playing against his Manchester City teammtes, Joleon Lescott and Joe Hart, the keeper. He and Hart smiled at each other before Balotelli calmly scored on the first penalty kick. In a way, Eusebio is the spiritual grandfather of Welbeck and Balotelli.. Born in Mozambique of an Angolan father, he chose to play for Portugal. In the 1966 World Cup, he was the stately, sturdy core of the team that defeated Pele’s Brazil, 3-1, in the first round, with Eusebio scoring two goals. Pele and Eusebio on the same pitch. Can you imagine? In the quarterfinal round, Eusebio was hacked and pummeled by the mystery team from North Korea, caught so vividly in the greatest documentary ever made about soccer -- the classic Goal. Eusebio responded with four goals within a 32-minute span in mid-match, carrying Portugal to a 5-3 victory. Portugal lost to the host team England, 2-1, in the semifinals but 1966 was still the high point of Portugal’s international soccer history. A championship in the Euros would bring Ronaldo up to Eusebio’s stature. Figo was not so lucky. He was aging in the 2002 World Cup when Portugal surrendered three quick goals to the United States and lost its first match, 3-2, and never reached the knockout range. So now Figo leaps in the air in celebration of Ronaldo. Well, don’t we all. With his smirks and scowls and self-centered preening – and that is just toward his teammates – Ronaldo is not the most appealing figure in this tournament. Just the best, He can leap like a pro basketball player, making himself dominant in scrums at both ends of the field. He lurks like Maradona did, but can accelerate like a Bo Jackson or Gale Sayers going around the end in American football. Suddenly he is there. He stunned the very good young Czech defender, Theo Gebreselassie, son of an Ethiopian-born doctor and a Czech mother, by zooming in for the goal that won the quarterfinal and sent Figo flying and Eusebio beaming. We will see Ronaldo again in the semifinals against the defending champions. Then Italy against Germany. Lucky us. (Always happy to have your opinions/reactions/critiques under COMMENTS) (And just in case you missed these goals, the precious heart of this sport. We celebrate them when they happen.) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rs4ahcHc-g http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYKs5VifNGU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HVgjeK_FFcA&feature=related
John McDermott
6/23/2012 06:22:27 am
Well done George. Another good one. I loved Wellbeck's and Balotelli's goals. For me, the goal of the tournament belongs to Ibrahimovic, against France. But, typical of Ibra when playing for Sweden, it came in a game where nothing was really on the line for his team. He wins games for Milan, but rarely does so for Sweden. And we saw two more great goals yesterday from Germany, born of the quick reactions and power of Khedira and Reus. Whoever faces them in the semi-final-Wellbeck's England or Balotelli's Italy-will have a big job to do. We still have a few more genuine great occasions to look forward before the annual pre-season cash-grab USA tours of various European teams in pre-season training.
George Vecsey
6/23/2012 06:42:37 am
John, thanks. Ibra is so strong. I groan when he starts dribbling down the field like a perchron. But he is so tough within 20-25 meters. That blind shot was amazing.
John McDermott
6/23/2012 07:26:25 am
I don't think Messi knows the difference between a friendly and a "real" game. In any case, there is no such thing as an exhibition game when Argentina and Brazil meet. Somehow Tottenham Hotspur v. LA Galaxy or Toronto FC v, Liverpool don't give me the same sense of anticipation. Though Real Madrid-AC Milan might be worth it, even in pre-season mode.
John McDermott
6/23/2012 08:43:22 am
And...Pele and Eusebio on the same pitch. "Can you imagine?" As a matter of fact, yes, at Yankee Stadium in the summer of 1968. It was one of the earliest of those tours of the USA by big clubs, Santos vs. Benfica and the place was completely packed. I went up from Philly with my Dad. Pele even nutmegged Eusebio which I will never forget.
Alan Rubin
6/23/2012 03:03:08 pm
George
George Vecsey
6/23/2012 03:16:08 pm
wow, that is a serious responsibility.
Hansen Alexander
6/24/2012 03:37:57 am
George, I too will depend on your coverage. I didn't watch these events but feel like I did after reading your summary. A magnificent writing, mixing the great Renaldo and an unmatched description of him, with historical overview in the manner only you can pull off. When you are writing about soccer, you are pure Hemingway, making me feel that i watched it too, or better yet, was at all those matches, including the Euro this week. Writing about this tournament cannot be a serious responsibility for you. You love soccer so much you are never self conscious, never doubting, never questioning what you write; words just flow out in melodic style. Maybe you should come out of retirement and just write about soccer. Or do what you don't want to do, turn your blog into a soccer site. You surely realize from the feedback you get that soccer is where your audience is. Man, you're only 72, you can have an entire career ahead of you just writing about this great game, because, as you put it recently, "Our time has come."
George Vecsey
6/24/2012 07:17:15 am
Hansen, thanks so much for the nice words. I get feedback on other stuff -- my tribute to Peter Fornatale got spread around. And the Father's Day essay got nice responses. If you can find somebody who will send me to the World Cup in Brazil in 2014, with credentials,I'll gladly do more soccer here. You don't watch these matches? So much better than our cumbersome and endless American "football." GV
Alan Rubin
6/25/2012 04:05:41 am
Your topics have a wide appeal because they have a humanitarian aspect. Soccer is certainly your trump suit, it is definitely not your entire hand.
Alan Rubin
6/25/2012 04:06:28 am
Your topics have a wide appeal because they have a humanitarian aspect. Soccer is certainly your trump suit, it is definitely not your entire hand.
Hansen Alexander
6/24/2012 11:36:06 am
I'll see what I can do about those credentials. They shouldn't even HOLD the World Cup without you in attendance.
Roy Edelsack
6/25/2012 12:40:18 am
I'll go further. "Goal," is the greatest sports documentary about any sport ever made. It's been 45 years since I've seen it but I still remember how the film is bookended by the quiet image of an old man unlocking and finally locking the gates to old Wembley. And the shame is you can't see it. It's never been on DVD and old VHS tapes are extremely rare. Comments are closed.
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Measuring Covid Deaths, by David Leonhardt. July 17, 2023. NYT online. The United States has reached a milestone in the long struggle against Covid: The total number of Americans dying each day — from any cause — is no longer historically abnormal…. After three horrific years, in which Covid has killed more than one million Americans and transformed parts of daily life, the virus has turned into an ordinary illness. The progress stems mostly from three factors: First, about three-quarters of U.S. adults have received at least one vaccine shot. Second, more than three-quarters of Americans have been infected with Covid, providing natural immunity from future symptoms. (About 97 percent of adults fall into at least one of those first two categories.) Third, post-infection treatments like Paxlovid, which can reduce the severity of symptoms, became widely available last year. “Nearly every death is preventable,” Dr. Ashish Jha, who was until recently President Biden’s top Covid adviser, told me. “We are at a point where almost everybody who’s up to date on their vaccines and gets treated if they have Covid, they rarely end up in the hospital, they almost never die.” That is also true for most high-risk people, Jha pointed out, including older adults — like his parents, who are in their 80s — and people whose immune systems are compromised. “Even for most — not all but most —immuno-compromised people, vaccines are actually still quite effective at preventing against serious illness,” he said. “There has been a lot of bad information out there that somehow if you’re immuno-compromised that vaccines don’t work.” That excess deaths have fallen close to zero helps make this point: If Covid were still a dire threat to large numbers of people, that would show up in the data. One point of confusion, I think, has been the way that many Americans — including we in the media — have talked about the immuno-compromised. They are a more diverse group than casual discussion often imagines. Most immuno-compromised people are at little additional risk from Covid — even people with serious conditions, such as multiple sclerosis or a history of many cancers. A much smaller group, such as people who have received kidney transplants or are undergoing active chemotherapy, face higher risks. Covid’s toll, to be clear, has not fallen to zero. The C.D.C.’s main Covid webpage estimates that about 80 people per day have been dying from the virus in recent weeks, which is equal to about 1 percent of overall daily deaths. The official number is probably an exaggeration because it includes some people who had virus when they died even though it was not the underlying cause of death. Other C.D.C. data suggests that almost one-third of official recent Covid deaths have fallen into this category. A study published in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases came to similar conclusions. Dr. Shira Doron, the chief infection control officer at Tufts Medicine in Massachusetts, told me that “age is clearly the most substantial risk factor.” Covid’s victims are both older and disproportionately unvaccinated. Given the politics of vaccination, the recent victims are also disproportionately Republican and white. Each of these deaths is a tragedy. The deaths that were preventable — because somebody had not received available vaccines and treatments — seem particularly tragic. (Here’s a Times guide to help you think about when to get your next booster shot.) *** From the great Maureen Dowd: As I write this, I’m in a deserted newsroom in The Times’s D.C. office. After working at home for two years during Covid, I was elated to get back, so I could wander around and pick up the latest scoop. But in the last year, there has been only a smattering of people whenever I’m here, with row upon row of empty desks. Sometimes a larger group gets lured in for a meeting with a platter of bagels." --- Dowd writes about the lost world of journalists clustered in newsrooms at all hours, smoking, drinking, gossipping, making phone calls, typing, editing. *** "Putting out the paper," we called it. Much more than nostalgia. ---https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/29/opinion/journalism-newsroom.html Categories
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