I Heart The EPL

Yesterday, for the first time since I decided to be an Arsenal fan (at least ten, maybe more years ago- Jesus, I'm getting old) I got to watch a North London Derby.  Sp*rs and Gunners locked in a rivalry game at the Emirates, live on my television and all without having to fork over an extra chunk of money for a premium sports package.  The right team won in the end (Gunners!) despite it not being the expected goal fest of fixtures past, it struck me again how awesome it was that finally, somehow, Premier League games were available, live and on my television.   It's awesome.

I was in high school the first time I got to watch a Premier League game.  The Quiet Man's Parentals had scored a free week of Fox Soccer Channel and if memory served he either taped the game or we watched it live.  I don't remember the picture quality or the commentating being that good- in fact, it seemed like something out of the 70s, to be totally honest and the teams?  Oh, at least one of them was Middlesborough.  And Paul Gascoigne was still playing for them.  (The identity of the other team still escapes me...   I want to say it was either Aston Villa or Newcastle United and the more I think about it, the more I think it was Villa.)

I couldn't tell you the score of the game or who won only that it was awesome that we could actually watch it.  I became a fan of soccer after the 1994 World Cup.  (Where the Cigar Parentals took us to a first round game in Chicago between Bolivia and Spain and we sat next to these super drunken assholes who were Spain fans who spilled beer on Mother Cigar.  Father Cigar expressed his displeasure at their douchebaggery and given the amount of murderous looks direct towards the Super Drunken Assholes by the Bolivia fans around us, if they had wanted to start some shit, I think Father Cigar would have had plenty of back up.  I'm pretty sure they were yelling some fairly vile curse words in Spanish at the Bolivian players.)

By the time the 1998 World Cup rolled around, I was ready to soak it all up.   England v Argentina in the second round remains probably one of the best sporting events I have ever seen.  Period.   And although England lost (how?  Say it with me, England fans:  ON PENALTIES!) the Dutch took out the Argies in the Quarterfinals so that made it slightly better.  (On a random note:  why did FIFA do away with the whole 'golden goal' thing.  It made extra time games more exciting instead of the inevitable 30 minutes followed by penalties.   I love sudden death overtime.)

And then I was in high school.  The MLS was in its infancy and was frankly, unwatchable and David Beckham was becoming a global superstar- which meant that everybody who wanted to 'do the soccer thing' was wearing a Manchester United jersey with his name and number on the back.*  But I wasn't about the bandwagon.  I wanted to do some research.  My second cousins were from Liverpool, so naturally they encouraged my conversion to the Red Devils- but were fine with anything so long as it wasn't a Manchester team.   The Quiet Man was a Chelsea fan and I didn't really want to rain on his parade.**   But I think- and I'm not entirely sure- I somehow learned that one of my Uncles was an Arsenal supporter.***  So I thought, why not?  At the time, I was the only Arsenal supporter in America I knew.  And it helped that (at the time) they were dominating everything they touched (they're still great now- and they landed Ozil! Could be a good/game changing season!) and had this guy:



(The above goal remains one of the most completely beautiful things I've ever seen.)

But I've never had the chance to real watch Arsenal games live on my television until this year.   And three weeks into the Premiership on NBC Sports Network and the Champions League on Fox Sports One, it's just awesome.  One of my goals in life (one of the attainable ones) has always been to be fiscally secure enough to afford to get the Fox Soccer Channel, as it was usually part of super premium cable/satellite packages.   Now it turns out that NBC Sports Network and Fox Sports 1 are going to make my dreams come true- and do it for free.

So sandwiched between the NFL and College Football, I'm going to have soccer.   Real, awesome soccer.  What a glorious fall it's shaping up to be.

P.S.  This isn't to say that I wouldn't love to see more MLS games, it's just that I'm either working or completely miss them when they're on television.   I actually haven't really picked an MLS team either...  I don't really feel the pressure to do so but I feel like if I'm going to really double down on this soccer thing, I should probably pick an MLS team as well just to show support to the league and to the sport over here as well.

*You could tell who the real poseurs were versus the real fans when Beckham went to Real Madrid.  Real fans stayed with ManU.  Poseurs ran out and got a Real Madrid Beckham jersey.

**He's also a fan of the Bundesliga and pays far more attention to it than I do.  I think his BL team is Hansa Rostock but now that I've typed that out, I don't think that's right.

***Weirdly, I've never actually asked Uncle Kelvin if he is an Arsenal supporter or not.  I suppose if he's not, I might have become an Arsenal fan spontaneously on my own.