The Spirit of Football. (Soccer)

 John Safar, Mark DeClouet, Sorin Stoica e Angela Ianni.

The spirit of football is not so much a rule, but an attitude... One way to play.

Based on a sporting spirit in which the players themselves (rule 03) are responsible for fair play. Encourages is a game of high competition, but never going against the mutual respect between them. The spirit is one of the fundamental principles of football. Without this, the game loses its charm, its heart. There has to be the Spirit!

Football is a dynamic sport and dressy, should be practiced by players who respect the Constitution of Football (rule book) and above all, the authority of the arbitrator (Rule 05) and the assistant referees (rule 06).

The play fair (fair play) is the blood sport, without this, football is not possible, because if the game is not ruled by a code of ethics, becomes chaos. And society football turns a primitive society. So, football will only survive with good sportsmanship, not as something gross, but that is established with respect to relations between players (opponents or not), referee and assistant referees.

For the researcher Antônio Roberto Santos, fair play suffers a strong influence of the media, the unsporting behavior of players is imitated by other famous athletes, mostly young adolescent, who "inspired" in their idols. He said that responsibility involves not only athletes, referees or officials, but also the fans and the media. The sports media, to make your calls for this or that game, is always a message inciting more confrontation, giving the impression that this is not a football game but more of a battle, "Today is going to have war in Pacaembu Corinthians and Palmeiras are struggling to survive. "This type of call infects the thoughts of fans who do not realize when the twist transcends rationality, becoming vandalism. Concludes the research.

Football players are laymen in relation to the Magna Carta (Rulebook) do not respect the referee and when asked about it remain unanswered, yet when a violation is called on his team just run up the referee arguing and gesticulating going the impression that they are true connoisseurs of the rules, such attitudes are applied as a lethal stroke in the vein of sportsmanship, making the playing field in a stage of debate.

Unfortunately, managers and coaches make it clear that the most important is not the football itself and even your spirit, but the result. The mind of the player is crafted to win at any cost and this conflicts with the spirit of the game, passing a negative message that the referee is the main responsible for the bad result of his team.

by: Valter Ferreira Mariano

Translated into English: by Light Jato - Toronto / Canada.