Image via Complex Original
Look, I get it. Soccer is an easily hated sport full of seedy old European men, animalistic-looking biters, and diving fairies for players. Bah humbug, soccer hater. It’s 2015, which means we’re living in the Year of Getting Over Yourself. The Boston Globe’s Dan Shaughnessy has been peddling the exact same anti-soccer spew for 25 years. Basically, you don’t want to be that guy, especially as soccer in the United States continues its upswing in popularity and profitability. If you’re a soccer fan and you have anyone within your circle of family and friends who’s a known soccer hater, please help them help themselves. Don’t let your friends and family become Dan Shaughnessy. Here are 10 Ways to Convert a Soccer Hater.
Play FIFA 15 once with the hater and let the video game do the rest.
This is an entry-level conversion tactic. If we had to guess, about 1-in-5 American soccer fans fell in love with the game because of an encounter with FIFA. Like it’s real-life imitator, FIFA is a free-flowing game of blue balls, heartache, and rambunctious celebrations. It takes a hot second for a newbie to figure out how goals are scored (Pro tip: If you hit L1 before a pass, the passer will make a forward run), but the learning curve isn’t steep.
You know how Madden liked to boast how its gamers are smarter fans? Same. FIFA gamers, whether they liked soccer or not before picking up the sticks, can’t turn the game off without checking the EPL or La Liga table after. A virtual obsession folds into a way of life. Never mind that the soccer hater in your life will become engrossed in the game’s inner-trappings. Collecting FIFA Ultimate Team’s digital cards and packs sounds nerdy, but for any person who grew up with Pokémon or Magic: The Gathering in their lives, this soccer game’s addictive equivalent is everything. That obsession is just going to happen, because nothing is better than opening a pack of cards and then playing with the players on those cards in a video game. The first season of Yu-Gi-Oh! proved that.
It’s the evolution from gamer to supporter that’s truly special. The way an isolated FIFA fan will flow into becoming a hardcore Real Madrid/Arsenal/Chelsea/Bayern Munich fan is natural, and relatively painless. It’s quite beautiful really, like a Metapod leveling up to a Butterfree. As a former “soccer is boring, I like baseball” type of sports fan, I can attest to FIFA’s transformative IRL powers. I’m not alone either. The likes of Snoop Dogg, A$AP Rocky, Drake, and J. Cole are well-known FIFA junkies, often playing endlessly to kill time while touring on the road. Since their early FIFA days, both Drake and J. Cole have visited stadiums such as Chelsea’s Stamford Bridge and Arsenal’s Emirates Stadium. All those rappers will tell you that you can’t play FIFA and walk away not thinking about soccer more and more.
This is, without a doubt, the first method to attempt when converting someone.
Wear fire soccer kits and *reads Four-Pins once* soccer-inspired jawns.
Luckily, Complex already has the hook-up when it comes to the most fire soccer jerseys ever. For the sartorialist soccer hater (or general hypebeast) in your life, emphasize the style statement being made by players during every game. These guys are out here playing sports in Yohji Yamamoto’s adidas-designed garments and jerseys with obvious streetwear influences—or just streetwear jerseys with obvious soccer influences, like these Supreme kits.
It’s not by accident that World Cup jerseys can be a part of a fire outfit—you saw how cats were rocking them over the summer. Culture obsessives, clever artists, and lifelong fashion lovers design them. Kit designers pour into the history and heritage behind every team they design for, stooping their product in tradition while adding modern twists. If the actual kits don’t fit your hater’s fancy (tough crowd), then peep how urban menswear designers used last summer’s World Cup as an excuse to release national team inspired collections.
Once that artistic nerve is struck, help channel your hater’s inner culture vulture further by firing off feelings for the sport beyond the playing field. Soccer’s not just an athletic outlet; it’s way to connect and express different passions, because ultimately sport, and soccer in particular, is a bonding agent. If you speak soccer, you’ve got millions of people out there to hit up. And with soccer culture growing more design-centric limbs, the beautiful game now has visual artists to back up its athletic ones.
No matter how vain soccer haters may be, the ones who are slaves to style should be able to shake off their hatred for the joy of wearing a dope jersey.
Play the damn sport.
Even if said hater hasn’t played since the rec league soccer days, get outside and have a kick around with your homies. Any pick-up sport can be fun when everyone involved also kind of sucks at the sport. Depending on your friend group, organizing a friendly match of struggle soccer should be possible. Respect for soccer can be gained by simply playing it—that’s how, like, 99 percent of the world’s soccer fans fell in love with the game in the first place.
Show the hater your commitment to the sport by adding indoor soccer sneakers (basically cleats without the spikes) into your rotation of daily kicks. That way, you’re prepared to hop in on any random free-flowing pick-up game you walk by. Thanks to this great day and age of sneaker innovation, there are select pairs with Yeezus-approved adidas boost technology in them, so any worries about discomfort or style in a soccer sneaker should be alleviated.
Lace up a fresh pair of boots and get out there.
Bring him or her to a bar at 10 a.m. on a Saturday to watch English Premier League soccer.
Getting up before brunch on a weekend isn’t ideal for everyone, but if you can get your hater to a supporter’s club bar to watch a match, then seize the opportunity. (Pro tip: Offer to buy the first drink.) Try gauging the soccer hater’s memory too: Remember how drunk we got during that World Cup match? Sell how fun last summer’s World Cup was—all the invite-only (and often open bar optioned) match parties, day drinking with co-workers, the pure fire of Twitter during live sporting events, the thrill of international competition—all that can be obtained week-in and week-out for European club soccer followers.
Be careful, however: Practically every bar in my neighborhood that doesn’t serve brunch, but wants to make money on weekend mornings, is now a “soccer bar.” Walking into an establishment with the wrong atmosphere will only give your hater additional ammunition.
In a proper supporter’s bar, make sure there’s fanatical singing, a shoulder-to-shoulder standing room viewing experience, and good Guinness on tap. These fans may be following teams representing cities six time zones away that they’ve never been to, but that just amplifies the passion. The lunacy of it all makes the connection that much greater.
See if your hater can vibe with match-day fan culture across the Atlantic. If he or she has a pulse, this one is a gimme.
Trick the hater into giving you money for an MLB game. Use that money to buy MLS tickets and force the hater to take in an MLS match with you.
Baseball games are boring. Live baseball games are also boring. The only bit that makes live baseball more exciting than televised baseball is the fact that you just paid real money to attend and breathe through a live baseball game, so you’re forced to tell yourself and your social media following what a blast you’re having.
Instead, liven things up a bit and head out to an MLS match. Everything about the day will be cheaper—including the quality of the play, mind you—but the energy at your nearest MLS-owned soccer-specific arena won’t be dampened. If you live in the New York area, try an outing at Red Bull Arena, or catch the newly imported superstar duo of David Villa and Frank Lampard play for NYC FC at Yankee Stadium. Elsewhere around MLS, two of the century’s best midfielders, Steven Gerrard and Kaka, are coming to America this summer too.
This idea works best if the soccer hater in your life has already refused an invitation to the Saturday morning bar run. And by “works best,” I mean “will completely infuriate him or her until the match.” (Pro tip: Always proceed with caution when lying and taking money from others.)
Show off the reality TV side of the beautiful game: dramatic narratives and big personalities.
In college, a sports management professor once told me that women love the NFL so much because it’s the best reality television show out there. At the time, I believed that to be true. Shortly after that class, I performed the “Mom Test” to investigate further. I asked my mother what she knew of then New York Jets quarterback, Mark Sanchez. She knew who he was all right, but only because he had made Page Six a month earlier for some playboy-like late-night adventures. The NFL had passed the Mom Test.
In hindsight, my professor was wrong—sort of. Women may love the NFL because of its celebrity confluence, but that’s why bros like it too. Bros love drama, especially when it concerns man-to-man pissing contests.
Oddly enough, the English phrase “taking the piss” is often used to describe one-sided matches. Pissing aside, the world of international soccer is full of colorful individuals, genius minds, and epic stories—just like in any other industry. Narrow in on a handful of them tailored to your hater’s interests.
Off the bat, try feeding your hater a dose of James Rodriguez. He’s baby-faced, has no problem carrying the World Cup hopes of a nation on his back, Rihanna loves him, and his jersey is an international best-seller. Oh, and he scored the best goal of 2014.
Have a “hang out and, like, just chill” day at your place and put on any one of the ESPN 30 for 30’s about soccer.
ESPN made eight episodes of 30 for 30: Soccer Stories in the run-up to the 2014 World Cup. They’re all wonderfully crafted pieces of documentary-style storytelling, but if there’s one ESPN soccer film to throw down the throat of a soccer hater, it’s the film The Two Escobars. It follows the dueling, intersecting narratives of 1980s drug kingpin Carlos Escobar and national soccer hero Andrés Escobar (of no relation). This real-life story is guaranteed to move your hater to tears.
Have an honest conversation about all the bad things about soccer.
This might be all that’s needed, TBH. See, the types of hate a soccer hater harbors can vary. That hater could just like other, more popular American sports more. Or maybe it’s the international corruption behind the sport that’s rubbing off poorly. All the diving doesn’t help either, I know. And yes, the beautiful game can be boring for stretches. These are all established problems facing soccer in America. And a big part of the problem with soccer fans in America—from my encounters, at least—is that some of them are reluctant to be upfront about their favorite sport’s ugly underbelly. That’s cowardly, and given all the heaven and hell coverage that the NFL, NBA, and MLB have been through recently, it’s hypocritical.
As the New York Times’ Art section incidentally exposed, there’s a “pretentious fan” problem in some American soccer circles. That’s got to go. It starts with having real discussions with people who don’t like soccer, and learning from what’s said. The hater in your life might even have something good to say.
Introduce the Men in Blazers.
English duo Roger Bennett and Michael Davies are the American soccer fan’s answer to Broad City’s Abbi and Ilana. Every Monday at 10 p.m., NBC gives the Men in Blazers a half-hour to riff on whatever happened over the weekend. Armed with an arsenal containing NBC’s EPL media rights, they give hilarious breakdowns of the game’s Vine-worthy moments. Other times, they go out and interview Andrew Luck in a literal “Breakfast Club” setting. It’s like ESPN’s SportsNation meets the hottest comedy act in England. Bennett and Davies are quirky, relatable, and they feel our pain. Whose pain? The pain of American soccer fans who have to fight for their sport’s respect online and over water coolers.
It’s a fight, and a good fight at that one. SportsCenter shows soccer highlights now. The World Cup was a solid month of unadulterated soccer love. It’s a winning battle, and one that draws its beliefs from the Men in Blazers’ descriptive salvo: “Men in Blazers is driven by the belief that Soccer is America’s Sport of the Future. As it has been since 1972.” Word.
Show the hater the future. It’s looking way up for footy, especially in the United States.
The come-up has been long coming, but at this point, the takeover is undeniable. The United States Soccer Federation is overhauling its youth development structure and pouring huge resources into improving soccer infrastructure around the country. MLS is starting to sign stars who aren’t totally washed up. Your go-to brunch spot may become a soccer bar within the next year. The Daily News lets Frank Isola, their NBA/Knicks beat writer, publish a "Futbol Monday" column. Times are changing, folks. The iron is hot for soccer in this country, and with a growing domestic league and a flourishing interest in international leagues, American soccer isn’t just a once-every-four-years thing anymore.
Let’s just put it this way: By 2026, Nate Silver projects U.S. soccer to be just as good as the Colombias and Argentinas of the world. THEN WHAT?
The clock is ticking on soccer haters.
