"Ronaldinho was too ugly to play for Madrid."
Okay, enough about the serious business of money in football, which is, after all, a serious business. Now onto the real controversy currently wracking the sport. Is this video faked, or is it real?
It's too bad FIFA doesn't have an physicist-in-residence, like Bob Adair, who was the official physicist of baseball's National League in the late 1980's. But if FIFA did have one, he might say this:
"The main reason why it's so hard to tell if this is real or faked is because the crossbar is circular in cross-section. As a result, the ball can rebound off the crossbar at a very different angle from the one at which it hits. However, the ball should always be losing speed, even if the crossbar is perfectly resilient - which we know it's not. The first time Ronaldinho strikes the crossbar, the ball appears to rebound initially at a higher speed. For that reason, the video is probably faked."
But don't listen to TDH's expert - he's only had one semester of university physics, anyway! Make up your own mind and let TDH know what you think by clicking "Post a Comment" below.
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Also, check out TDH's new feature, in the right-hand column: goals per 90 minutes for players with four or more strikes in the Premiership. Not that Sven should base his World Cup picks on the first dozen matches of the season, but isn't it strange how several of his favorite forwards - Crouch, Heskey, Defoe - don't even show up on this list? Moreover, Vassell is hardly good value. But of course, we already knew that.
It's too bad FIFA doesn't have an physicist-in-residence, like Bob Adair, who was the official physicist of baseball's National League in the late 1980's. But if FIFA did have one, he might say this:
"The main reason why it's so hard to tell if this is real or faked is because the crossbar is circular in cross-section. As a result, the ball can rebound off the crossbar at a very different angle from the one at which it hits. However, the ball should always be losing speed, even if the crossbar is perfectly resilient - which we know it's not. The first time Ronaldinho strikes the crossbar, the ball appears to rebound initially at a higher speed. For that reason, the video is probably faked."
But don't listen to TDH's expert - he's only had one semester of university physics, anyway! Make up your own mind and let TDH know what you think by clicking "Post a Comment" below.
---
Also, check out TDH's new feature, in the right-hand column: goals per 90 minutes for players with four or more strikes in the Premiership. Not that Sven should base his World Cup picks on the first dozen matches of the season, but isn't it strange how several of his favorite forwards - Crouch, Heskey, Defoe - don't even show up on this list? Moreover, Vassell is hardly good value. But of course, we already knew that.
posted by Daniel Altman at 2:04 PM
2 Comments:
unfortunately, my dialup is far too slow to let me check out the video. But Ron being so god-like, I would have to guess that its real. Even without seeing it.
but I did just watch highlights of Barca hammering Getafe. What an ugly away kit...
by the way - check out the first line of this, under the title. Freaky. I can't work out why he's chosen to mention that....
http://football.guardian.co.uk/rumourmill/index/0,1451,1636925,00.html
Basically a Nike guy comes to the Camp Nou to give the buck-toothed genius his new golden boots. Said genius puts them on, finds a ball, juggles over to the top of the 18-yard box, volleys the ball onto the crossbar, catches the perfectly angled rebound on his body, and repeats twice. The controversy concerns the sequential prangs of the woodwork.
There was a Guardian article with the Malawi statistic a couple of years ago, but I can't imagine that was the cause of the sub-headline on that article.
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