It’s the morning of June 23 in Reykjavik, Iceland. The Germany versus Ghana World Cup 2010 match is about to begin. And I need to find a place to watch it.
It would be easy to walk into one of the many bars and check out the action. But frankly, I’m not up for the beer or greasy food that would be the admission charge. What I really need is a soccer-friendly coffee shop.
Proof You Don’t Need Beer and Bad Food for Soccer
And I found one: Café Rót, a two-story nonprofit coffee bar (read about other great coffeehouses in Reykjavik). Upstairs, it’s the typical place to get espresso – lots of worn books to read, people debating philosophy, artsy types pounding on laptop computers. Downstairs, there’s a huge TV screen showing the match in high definition. Fans are already staking claim to spots on an array of leather couches in front of the screen. As long as you buy any drink from the coffee bar upstairs or the refrigerator downstairs, you’re welcome to watch.
This is exactly what’s missing from the United States, and part of the reason interest in soccer is stunted. Most matches are shown on obscure cable channels deep into the cable networks’ ridiculous tier system. I have no interested in the Home Shopping Network, yet it seems to be a requirement if I’d want to watch some Bundesliga matches. Even Major League Soccer matches are seldom televised on broadcast networks.
Cable Companies Squeeze Soccer Out
Since I’m not even a cable subscriber, my soccer-watching options are pretty grim. If there was a cable plan that allowed me to skip channels I don’t want and still get some soccer-friendly stations, I would. That’s not currently in the cards.
My other option? When I’m home in Phoenix, I could walk a few blocks to a nearby sports bar and watch the game there. There are more than a few places fairly close to my home that show it. The problem is, they’re all bars. Maybe some people are willing to drink a bunch of beers or eat fatty bar food to watch the game. I’m not. I love watching soccer, probably more than 95 percent of the people watching it in an American sports bar at any time. But I’m also pretty fastidious about my calorie intake (I know someone is going to joke about a soccer-loving, calorie-counting American male – feel free to insert your joke here).
Bring it to the Coffeehouse
That’s where a place like Café Rót comes in. I could show up, buy a cappuccino or two (I’ll skip the sugary mochas, thanks, but they’re still there for people who want them) and enjoy a few matches. That would be far better than the plate of sausages, salty gravy and bland mashed potatoes I had to choke down to watch the Spain versus Holland match when I return to Phoenix.
For some reason, televisions in coffee shops seldom catch on in the United States. And if they do, they’re certainly not showing soccer. I’d blame that on the perception that sports are lowbrow, and many coffeehouses pride themselves on being castles of the intellectual. Never mind that soccer spans politics, social classes and geography, I guess.
Establishments like Café Rót could change the way we consume sports in the United States. Watching sports at home works for those who have cable, but soccer needs a group environment to gain more traction. I enjoyed the Germany-Ghana match far more being around other knowledgeable fans. It adds to the experience.
And this country needs to wean itself from the idea that watching sports must go hand-in-hand with cheap beer and stuffing out gullets with bad bar food. That’s not true of soccer, but any sport that calls people to gather.
There are others to blame: small-minded sports editors, the saturation of mainstream American sports, the anti-foreign-sport bias. Those will take longer to change.
Getting a few coffee shops to embrace soccer? Really, that should be pretty easy.
