Friday
Seldom it is that one’s favorite team reaches the World Cup final, but that’s my enviable situation. (France’s success helps offset my grief over Roger Federer losing at Wimbledon.) Everyone is predicting a French win, which of course has me very nervous. I worry that Croatia is the little engine that could.
The 1930 story features a little blue engine that agrees to help a broken-down train when larger engines refuse. To add urgency to the mission, the train is “full of good things for boys and girls” on the other side of the mountain. Demonstrating both the value of believing in oneself and of helping others, the blue engine chants the well-known mantra, “I think I can, I think I can,” as she strains to pull the train up the mountain. The onomatopoeic ending of the story is filled with self-satisfaction: “I thought I could, I thought I could, I thought I could.”
When Croatia was in the midst of its third overtime game in a row, it must have felt like the little engine, convincing itself it could push the outer limits and succeed. In the game against Russia, the goalkeeper went down with a hamstring pull yet played on, making a critical save in the penalty shootout. Somehow the team kicked into a higher gear against England in extra time, scoring the game-winning goal to make it through to the final. An ESPN article explains the self- deception at the core of Croatia’s efforts:
[Winning is] about lies and deception. The lies you tell your body in an attempt to deceive it into thinking your hit points aren’t down to zero. And the lies you tell yourself when you convince yourself that, yes, you can reach that stray ball and, no, you won’t let that opponent pass. Most of all, it’s about believing that you can keep going through heavy legs, searing pain and shortness of breath.
The little blue engine analogy is even more appropriate given that Croatia, were it to win, would be the second smallest country ever to win the World Cup. (Uruguay takes top honors.) Usually large countries like Brazil, Germany, France, Argentina and Spain end up victorious.
So how can one find drama rooting for heavily-favored France, a team that has played 90 fewer minutes that Croatia (equal to a full game) and appears to be clicking on all cylinders? Who cheers for Goliath and might not we see a contest ending as that one did in Robert Graves’s version of what really happened?
Loud laughs Goliath, and that laugh
Can scatter chariots like blown chaff
To rout: but David, calm and brave,
Holds his ground, for God will save.
Steel crosses wood, a flash, and oh!
Shame for Beauty’s overthrow!
(God’s eyes are dim, His ears are shut.)
One cruel backhand sabre cut —
‘I’m hit! I’m killed!’ young David cries,
Throws blindly forward, chokes . . . and dies.
And look, spike-helmeted, grey, grim,
Goliath straddles over him.
Here’s one drama to hold on to if you’re for France. In the 2016 European finals, the heavily favored French team had its “Casey at the Bat” moment, losing to underdog Portugal. Surely two such moments would be too cruel.
Although most people don’t know about it, there is a sequel to Grantland Rice’s famous poem. Casey has paid for his hubris with public humiliation and is a shadow of his former self:
All his past fame was forgotten – he was now a hopeless “shine.”
They called him “Strike-Out Casey,” from the mayor down the line;
And as he came to bat each day his bosom heaved a sigh,
While a look of hopeless fury shone in mighty Casey’s eye.
He pondered in the days gone by that he had been their king,
That when he strolled up to the plate they made the welkin ring;
But now his nerve had vanished, for when he heard them hoot
He “fanned” or “popped out” daily, like some minor league recruit.
France too has been derided for the way it froze against Portugal. Can’t one root for a team that has fallen flat in the past. Oedipus gets a second shot at glory, and so does Casey:
The pitcher smiled and cut one loose – across the plate it sped;
Another hiss, another groan. “Strike one!” the umpire said.
Zip! Like a shot the second curve broke just below the knee.
“Strike two!” the umpire roared aloud; but Casey made no plea.
No roasting for the umpire now – his was an easy lot;
But here the pitcher whirled again – was that a rifle shot?
A whack, a crack, and out through the space the leather pellet flew,
A blot against the distant sky, a speck against the blue.
Above the fence in center field in rapid whirling flight
The sphere sailed on – the blot grew dim and then was lost to sight.
Ten thousand hats were thrown in air, ten thousand threw a fit,
But no one ever found the ball that mighty Casey hit.
Sports is all about narrative, and neutral observers often choose the one that stirs their hearts the most. I understand those who will be supporting the little Balkan country that could, but biased as I am, I’m going with the redemption story.
