So the World Cup has come and gone again. This year it seemed like more people in the US payed attention than last time. I sure hope that this trend continues. Over the past month I have watched a ton of soccer and had the time to think about how alien the game is to those of us in the USA. I feel that between the timing and all the diving will keep pro soccer on the back burner.

The timing of the sport is wacko. Counting up it totally foreign. We have to first know that they play for 90 minutes and then subtract the time on the clock from 90 to figure out how much time is left. Americans don’t want to know how much time has elapsed, we want to know how much is left until we can go get food and use the bathroom. To make matters worse there aren’t any commercial breaks so if you don’t have a DVR you have to hold it. There is a halftime at 45 minutes. Stoppage time does get added on at the half and end because the clock never stops. It gets totally confusing to play until 47 minutes, stop for halftime and then reset the clock to 45. This makes no sense to Americans.

Another reason is diving. To Americans this is not viewed as unsportsmanlike or fair. Seeing people constantly fall down clutching their knee my appeal to those in the English Premier League and other European Leagues, but not here in the US.

Low scoring and long games don’t help either, but fakers and weird timing make this game unfriendly in the US.