Strange that some on here are laughing that Germany are out

[WES]

Well The Mirror (under Piers Morgan) published this in 1998.

Attachment 946

And a truly rational, mature, adult male wouldn't care about football in the first place, you spastic.

Nonsense and you know it. Our love of football is no different than a love of ballet or fine art or architecture etc etc

The culture surrounding those pursuits may be very different, but the fundamental desire is the same.

[Burney]

Nonsense and you know it. Our love of football is no different than a love of ballet or fine art or architecture etc etc

The culture surrounding those pursuits may be very different, but the fundamental desire is the same.

You're equating sport with art, which tells me you know very little about either.

[Sir C]

You're equating sport with art, which tells me you know very little about either.

Of course there is a connection between sport and art, inasmuch as both are to a degree driven by the pursuit of the exceptional and a search for the extraordinary.

[Burney]

Of course there is a connection between sport and art, inasmuch as both are to a degree driven by the pursuit of the exceptional and a search for the extraordinary.

Hmmm. That sounds like an attempt to try and fit the square peg of sport into the round hole of art. Art to me is a deliberately unpragmatic attempt to make sense of human existence. Sport, on the other hand, seems to me to be society's means of sublimating the natural competitiveness, aggression and athleticism of young men into a socially-acceptable form that also happens to be an enjoyable spectacle.

[Sir C]

Hmmm. That sounds like an attempt to try and fit the square peg of sport into the round hole of art. Art to me is a deliberately unpragmatic attempt to make sense of human existence. Sport, on the other hand, seems to me to be society's means of sublimating the natural competitiveness, aggression and athleticism of young men into a socially-acceptable form that also happens to be an enjoyable spectacle.

I think there is a definite crossover area. Consider the footballer who has trained his body to achieve the kind of balletic grace and control exhibited by Cruyff, Henry or Messi - this degree of exertion surely points to an individual seeking the truth of the human condition, much like, for example, the ballerina?

[Burney]

I think there is a definite crossover area. Consider the footballer who has trained his body to achieve the kind of balletic grace and control exhibited by Cruyff, Henry or Messi - this degree of exertion surely points to an individual seeking the truth of the human condition, much like, for example, the ballerina?

OK, but the footballer doesn't do this with the intention of looking good or making any point about anything. He does it with the narrow goal of winning a football match. Besides, in ballet, the dancers are just a tool - they're not artists in their own right. The 'art' lies in the writing of the music and the choreography. The dancing is just the technical physical expression of the art.

[Sir C]

OK, but the footballer doesn't do this with the intention of looking good or making any point about anything. He does it with the narrow goal of winning a football match. Besides, in ballet, the dancers are just a tool - they're not artists in their own right. The 'art' lies in the writing of the music and the choreography. The dancing is just the technical physical expression of the art.

No no no no no no no no. You misuderstand absolutely the motivation of the top class sportsman. He trains not to win the game, but to be the very best he can - to be extraordinary.

Like the ballerina.

[Ash]

You're equating sport with art, which tells me you know very little about either.

Are you saying you know more than Arsene Wenger, my friend?

[Sir C]

Are you saying you know more than Arsene Wenger, my friend?

Any activity, undertaken with love, coimmitment and skill can be defined as art or, indeed, prayer.

[Ash]

OK, but the footballer doesn't do this with the intention of looking good or making any point about anything. He does it with the narrow goal of winning a football match. Besides, in ballet, the dancers are just a tool - they're not artists in their own right. The 'art' lies in the writing of the music and the choreography. The dancing is just the technical physical expression of the art.

And when Constable drew a lansdscape he was merely applying technical brush-strokes to express the creation of man and god, presumably.