Football vs Rugby

Some of you might have heard that there is an ongoing Rugby Organisation in South Africa. Participants of this tour are British & Irish Lions (Multinational Rugby Team consists of the best Rugby players of Ireland, England, Wales, and Scotland), South Africa, and some other rugby teams. Games take place in South Africa and watched by thousands of rugby fans.

Last game between South Africa and British & Irish lions played on 20th of June 2009 in The Absa Stadium which is located in South African city Durban.

I'm posting above information because I'd like to show difference between rugby and football games played in same country. (and possibly watched by similar type of audience) First video is from a Confederations Cup game played between Italy and Brazil. You can easily remember the noise of the vuvuzela.

Below video is from Rugby game played between South Africa and British and Irish Lions on 20th of June 2009.

Look at the fans watching rugby game, you can see their reactions to referee decisions, player mistakes, and speed of the game. You can feel the fans. And they are enjoying the game absolutely.

Why is this difference? Absa Rugby Stadium Manager Gary Parker-Nance said that vuvuzelas were definitely not allowed at the stadium during rugby matches. Here is what he said;

"This is because many of the rugby patrons have complained about the noise that emanates from the vuvuzela and we have to take into consideration what the majority of people want."

If you read the article, you can see that some people say vuvuzela is the part of all South African sport and some say it is part of South African football. First, they should decide what is this vuvuzela? Is it really a part of their sports/football culture or not and then we can think on it.

Can't Hear Ya!

US and Glasgow Rangers midfielder Damarcus Beasley made a crucial mistake during the game against 5 times World Cup Winner Brazil, which led to the goal. US Midfielder failed to read a short corner move from fellow midfielder Landon Donovan.

Two days ago, he apologized from his teammates and tried to explain why he made the mistake. He thinks;

"With South African fans blowing on their noisy vuvuzela trumpets at Loftus Versfeld Stadium, Beasley said he simply didn't hear a call from Donovan to expect the kick."

Lost Vuvuzelas

According to goal.com, FIFA quietly banned sale of vuvuzelas inside stadiums. One of the goal.com reporters tried to find/buy a vuvuzela but s/he couldn't manage to get one. Story is here.

Who knows, FIFA might have tried to see if noise decreased after banning the sale of vuvuzelas inside/around the stadiums. Italy - Brazil match will start shortly and I'd like to see if I could manage to watch game without touching the mute button of my TV's remote control.

Milliyet

One of the most-read national newspapers of Turkey, Milliyet, published an article about vuvuzelas. Article mentions this blog and calls its disturbed readers to support us. It says;

"If you're against vuvuzelas, banthevuvuzela.blogspot.com address is waiting for your support."

Article in Turkish can be seen here.
For English translation, please click here.

Ik ben met u*

To be fair, if this thing, blowing vuvuzelas, is part of South African football culture (which is not very clear), South African fans can bring their vuvuzelas when SA team plays the game, blow them until their lungs come out and ears blown, noone can say anything.

Couple of days back, well-known Spanish National and Liverpool midfielder Xabi Alonso joined us and told similar things. Now, another important name from football world, Dutch coach Bert Van Marwijk, commented on vuvuzelas. Guess what, he is also against them. His words are;

"At home watching TV it really was annoying, but in the stadiums you get used to it but it is still unpleasant. You want to coach your players during the match but it is almost impossible with that noise. So for me the horns can stay outside the stadium."

Full article can be seen on Guardian website.

Thanks to Tommy who made me aware of above statement with his comment.
* Translate with Google Translate.

For the Good of the Ears

If FIFA wouldn't ban the vuvuzelas during World Cup 2010, we kindly request from them to give earplugs to ticketholders.
(free of charge of course!)

Truth or Fiction?

Today, I was reading couple of forums and one message has drawn my attention. It was posted by an anonymous South African football fan and it's about the vuvuzela. I've taken below lines from the original message without touching any word of it. Just read it and decide yourselves.

"I have been attending local football games since I was four years old (with my dad obviously at that stage) and in those days people used to scream, clap, sing etc. in much the same fashion as you would find in any other country. The twist is that there was always one or two chaps blowing a kudu (a type of antelope) horn as a trumpet but then only doing so sporadically during the course of the game (this was quirky and pretty cool).


I think it was around 2000 that some numpty started importing millions of cheap plastic trumpets from China which then quickly caught the attention of those people who always wanted to blow a kudu horn of their own but didn't know where to get one. It has now become such a feature of the local game that people seem to think that it is a traditional aspect of the local game. In truth, it's not. Some dude in China is making a killing and real supporters are increasingly becoming disenchanted with attending local games live for fear of losing their hearing. Casual fans on the other hand (obviously) love them to bits. You think they're bad on television? Try sitting next to or in front of someone blowing one of those things over an entire game. Ban them I say!"

It makes sense to us, what do you think?

I always prefer to include links pointing to the original location of article. But this time, link is broken. So, if I find the post again, I'll include link here. If this person is you, please enlighten us.

Join Us, Support Us

There are many other friends who support the same idea and try to make FIFA aware about the issue. 2010 FIFA World Cup without vuvuzelas! You can come and join us on one of the following networks.


On Facebook, there are two global groups with more than 1000 members in total. First group is Ban the Vuvuzela 2010. Description of this group is

"With all the International Soccer fans coming to SA one would think they would like to watch a soccer game without the annoying noise of the Vuvuzela.

Lets see how many members we can get, from all over the world to show FIFA and SA Government that they need to ban it."

Name of other group is Ban the Vuvuzela and you can join and share your thoughts on this group also.


You can follow us on Twitter. Just search for #ban_the_vuvuzela on twitter searchbox and see what people are talking about. If you want to post your thoughts, please don't forget to include #ban_the_vuvuzela in your post.

Please note that there is no connection between this blog and any other Facebook and/or Twitter groups. We just share same idea.

Perspective

We've talked about Vuvuzela, expressed our feelings about it and looked only from fans' perspective so far. Let's see what Spanish Cultured Midfielder Xabi Alonso thinks about it;

According to NY Times;

“I find these vuvuzelas annoying. They don’t contribute to the atmosphere in the stadium. They should put a ban on them.”

and BBC;

"I think they should be banned. They make it very difficult for the players to communicate with each other and to concentrate. They are a distraction and do nothing for the atmosphere."

It's good to know that someone on the pitch feels in a same way and shares our feelings. Go Xabi go.

The Power of Television

According to BBC (and of course, some others) FIFA President Sepp Blatter said he is aware that vuvuzelas has drawn complaints from European television stations. FIFA President said broadcasters wanted it banned at this tournament (2009 Conf Cup) and next year's World Cup in South Africa.

"Blatter said football's governing body would discuss the matter with the organisers."

Full article can be read from here.

Income from TV is an important part of football today and if major broadcasting companies push this further, I'm sure that FIFA will have to take necessary actions against it or at least they will try to reduce the noise. (They might even invent something to filter out this noise from broadcasts. Sure!)

Well, I don't like banning things (like torches) but vuvuzela is different, you know what i mean...

Good news! (Not so good..)

I have been watching Confederations Cup game between South Africa and New Zealand on RTE and according to presenter, FIFA President Sepp Blatter announced that FIFA will conduct a meeting and dicsuss the future of vuvuzela. They might ban vuvuzela during World Cup 2010.

I will post links related to announcement when I have them.

Update: "Sepp Blatter admitted the vuvuzelas affected television broadcasts and said that FIFA would look into the matter but there were no plans to ban vuvuzelas."

"But because of complaints of European broadcasters that their listeners could hardly hear them above the din of the trumpets, Blatter said he would take it up with local organisers ahead of the World Cup."

Links: sport24.co.za newzimbabwe.com

Let's see what happens next! Don't give up!

Spread the Word

We didn't expect that there are many people sharing same feeling about the noise of vuvuzela. Many thanks to all of you.

Also, there are couple of other blogs supporting this blog, thanks them too.

We've just started, there is still plenty of time until World Cup 2010, please continue voting and leaving comments. We'll send your comments to major broadcasting companies and FIFA.

Chanting vs Vuvuing

There are different ways to support your team; you can chant like Olympiacos fans,

or you can play an instrument that doesn't make meaningless noise, it actually cheers you like Caballito fans,



You can find a good way to make noise but what is that vuuuu? It's ok, vuvuzela has a special meaning for SA fans and blowing it is like a tradition but why rest of the world has to listen that noise?


One other thing is that FIFA has already given permission for SA fans to bring these things to matches. (News item can be read from here.)


There must be a way to stop this or at least SA fans can blow it when their team plays a game. But not during Brazil or England or any other teams' games. I want to hear fans chanting and Brazilian samba music filling my ears, not this noise!

Ban the Vuvuzela!

I am trying to watch FIFA Confederations Cup South Africa 2009 these days but some noise makes me sick and I can not even enjoy the game itself.

When I googled it, I've learnt that this thing is called as vuvuzela and is used by South African Soccer Fans. Below is the definition of vuvuzela taken from Wikipedia.

"A vuvuzela, sometimes called a 'lepatata' (its Setswana name) or a stadium horn, is an air horn, approximately one metre in length, commonly blown by fans at soccer matches in South Africa. The origin of the name is disputed; it may originate from the Zulu for "making noise", or from the "vuvu" sound it makes, or from township slang related to the word for "shower"."

Here is a picture of vuvuzelas,

For those who haven't heard what kind of noise this thing makes, watch (just listen actually) this video,



or this one,



and hear it yourselves.

It is so late to take an action or raise concerns for ongoing FIFA Confederations Cup South Africa 2009, but we can raise our concerns and let FIFA know this thing called "vuvuzela" takes all the enjoyment of the game and should be banned during 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa.

Just vote! Thanks.