Sunday 11 July 2010

(un)gratitude

What tea goes with losing the World Cup final? Winning would be an easy answer. I'd think of a regal Darjeeling or an exquisite green tea.

Instead, I'd like to consider what the losers get. And they really are losers. The Dutch knew that they couldn't win with pure football, so they chose to play dirty. To foul and bruise and elbow their way to penalties after one hundred and twenty minutes. Thankfully, the Spanish won in a fair way despite the tactics of their opponent.

For the Vice Champions, I'd serve a Japanese Bancha, which is described at Wikipedia in this way:


Bancha (番茶?, coarse tea)
Lower grade of Sencha harvested as a third or fourth flush tea between summer and autumn. Aki-Bancha (autumn Bancha) is not made from entire leaves, but from the trimmed unnecessary twigs of the tea plant.


Rather fitting for a team that played rough and went down complaining. Sort of like Bill Lambeer on the old Detroit Pistons teams. You despise him unless he's on your side, and then you likely think the ends justify the means. And for that sort of thinking you get a steaming mug of unnecessary twigs. It's not bad tea, actually. You were probably hoping for something top-shelf.

And like the Netherlands national football team you'd pout as they did being anointed with their runners-up necklaces. You ungrateful bastard, you.

2 comments:

  1. Haha I wouldn't think Bancha would be a second place tea!
    How about a Farmer's Brothers teabag?
    =p
    Especially considering the dirty play!

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  2. Granted The Dutch deserved most of those yellow cards, but if you were watching the game, you should feel that Spain should have gotten a few more cards, especially in that blatant impediment against Robben in the second half, which he nearly got away from to still almost score, something for which a card was not given to Spain (The announcers stated that it probably should have been a red), and prevented a likely goal which would have caused Spain to loose. The funny thing about that is Robben got a Yellow for questioning the Ref's lack of a call on that play.

    Either way Spain should be rewarded for the win they did play very well, but the Netherlands deserve far better than Bancha.

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