Polish Football Fans Unfurl 50-Foot ‘Stand And Defend Christianity’ Banner At Premier League Match

by Raheem Kassam and Oliver Lane

Polish football (soccer) fans unveiled an enormous anti mass migration banner at Sunday’s Silesian Wrocław match against Poznań. Images from the match last night show a giant crusader defending Europe from invading jihadists in boats labelled USS Hussein, USS Bin Laden and USS ISIS.

(Breitbart) Just a week after Poland voted to kick out every left-wing member of it’s national parliament, ordinary Poles have again shown the spirit which led them to elect the nationalist conservative Law and Justice party, with football fans unveiling an over-sized anti-migration banner at Sunday’s match.

The hand-painted sheet, which is estimated to have been at least 50 feet tall and 75 feet wide depicts boatloads of migrants preparing to land on the southern shore of Europe. Many of the boat’s crews make the one fingered ‘ISIS salute’.

Defending Europe while clutching a sword and a shield showing the crest of the Silesian Wrocław football club, a St. George’s cross-wearing crusader stands ready to fight the migrants, below writing which reads “While Europe Is Flooded With An Islamic Plague”.

Underneath, another 100 foot wide banner hangs from the stalls behind the goal and reads, in a traditional Polish script: “Let Us Stand In Defence Of Christianity”.

Wrocław football club has one of the largest supporter bases in Poland, and the most politically active. Banners with strong anti-Communist messages are commonly seen at their games – and the fans like to get involved.

As well as football scarves which split space between the crests of the team, Poland, and anti-Islam symbols, banners seen at past matches have also condoned violence towards supporters of left-wing political views.

Wrocław maintains a strong friendship with Legia Warsaw, another politically active football team.

Legia has been fined on a number of occasions by football governing body UEFA over supposed racism at matches, and has displayed banners mocking Islamic jihad.

Link:

• Polish Football Fans Unfurl 50-Foot ‘Stand And Defend Christianity’ Banner At Premier League Match

Jim Harbaugh's Missionary Pilgrimage

By Steve Schrader, Detroit Free Press

And why is Jim Harbaugh tweeting from Peru? Is he doing a satellite Michigan football camp there, too?

No, he's on his annual missionary pilgrimage to help the Santisimo Sacramento Catholic parish in the village of Piura, a poverty-stricken town 600 miles north of Lima.

It's something Harbaugh has done since 2009. Last year's eight-day trip was documented by Comcast Sports Network Bay Area for an hourlong special: "Peruball: Jim Harbaugh in South America."

"You can pretty much help someone from the time you wake up until the time you go to bed," Harbaugh told Comcast then. "It's beyond rewarding; it's a chance to do something..."

 

Links:

• Where is Jim Harbaugh now? Peru (photos)
• Jim Harbaugh tweets deflate-gate joke from Peru

"NFL 2015" - A Bad Lip Reading of The NFL

Gene Simmons Defends Tim Tebow - "He’s Proud to be a Christian, What’s Wrong with That?"

 

 (AFP/Getty Images)

(CBS/Radio.com) Has polarizing football player Tim Tebow gotten a raw deal in the press because of his religious beliefs? And would he be treated more respectfully if he were not Christian, and specifically, Muslim? Gene Simmons thinks so.

“He’s got a religious passion, as well he should, we’re in America,” the KISS frontman told Radio.com earlier this week. ”He’s proud to be a Christian, what’s wrong with that? And yet, with sports media and pop culture media, they make fun of his religion. Really? In America? If he was wearing a burqa, they wouldn’t dare say anything [editor's note: only Muslim women wear burqas].

But if you’re a Christian, you get to be picked on? What the hell? The guy’s got family values. I never saw the media picking on Michael Vick for torturing dogs. Or this other football player, who’s alleged to have killed, committed murder.  That’s ‘cool.’ But a guy who’s religious and has got family values isn’t ‘cool?’ He’s cool to me...”  (continued)

Link:

• Interview: Gene Simmons Defends Tim Tebow, Wants Football To Be More Like KISS

Bad Lip Reading: Football Players

"These games are a joke."

 Photo - ChurchMilitant.TV Facebook 

"These games are a joke." — Former Dallas Cowboys quarterback and current NFL broadcaster Troy Aikman

"Well, the officials decided a game." - Adam Schefter, ESPN

By Jim Litke

(AP) If you tried to stage a photograph to symbolize the confusion that’s dogged the NFL and its games since commissioner Roger Goodell let a lockout of the regular officials spill over into the regular season, you couldn’t have done it any better.

The reaction was predictable, overwhelmingly negative, and swift. Anyone still have questions about the integrity of the game? Thought so.

Let’s put it this way: If the NFL were a hamburger chain, Goodell would have been fired on the spot...

Link:

• NFL deserves Seahawks-Packers botched ending

The End of Football Fast Approaches

From Rush Limbaugh:

RUSH: When I predicted, ladies and gentlemen, that the American left would soon begin its effort to ban professional football, I realized I'd be greeted with a bunch of catcalls. And I knew that I would be greeted with, "Come on, Rush, I've never heard anything more ridiculous! It is the national pastime. It is the most popular sport in the history of sports. It's the wealthiest. It's the richest. You gotta be crazy."

I said, "I know liberals. I know them! When the legal community gets involved, when the plaintiff's bar gets revved up, when lawsuits start flying about concussions and all that, it's over, folks. I'm telling you. It's just a matter of when." I thought it would be 15, 20 years. But over the weekend, George Will (no liberal he) submitted a column that was headlined in the New York Post, "Football's Growing Killer Problem."

Basically George Will in his column says that football is killing its players and cannot be fixed.

There is simply no way to change the game to make it safer and maintain the game as it is. You can't take head contact out of football. There's no way you can coach changes. For example, when I played football in high school, they always taught you to see what you hit. Do not lower your head as in a battering ram and go after somebody 'cause that's spinal and neck compression. That's how you break your neck. Don't do that. Always keep your head up and always see what you hit. Okay. That was to prevent broken necks.
Well, what that led to was more and more concussions.

Because guys are hitting each other with the crown of their helmet right there on the front of the lobe, sometimes in the head of another player. Or somebody gets kneed. His point is: You can't take this out of the game. You cannot stop people getting concussions in this game as the players are growing larger. He says, "In 1980, only three NFL players weighed 300 or more pounds." Last year, there were 352 players who weighed over 300, and three players who weighed over 350. And he says in his piece they're as fast as cats. I mean, these guys aren't lumbering, doddering old slobs. These are fast-moving and very quick. The kinetic energy that they are generating is something the human body can no longer tolerate. He talked about it on This Week Sunday as well. I'll pay you some sound bites of that when we get back.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Now, look, folks, we're gonna talk about football here for a second, but I want you to hang in because this is cultural and this has to do with the future of the country.  This is not football prognostication, it's not X's and O's.  Stick with me on this.  It's important, and it matters.  Not just George Will.  George Will has a column basically saying that football is killing its players, and it can't be fixed.  He opens the column: "Are you ready for some football? First, however, are you ready for some autopsies?"

Now, there are a lot of other sports that feature concussions.  Boxing.  You know one of the fastest growing sports out there is the cage stuff, UFC, Ultimate Fighting Championship.  That stuff's growing by leaps and bounds.  I even hear the Southern Poverty Law Center likes that sport.  Rugby has concussions.  Baseball has concussions.  There are injuries in every sport.  But I'm telling you it's open season on football.  That's the thing.  It's open season on football, and it's now become bipartisan.  It's crossed the partisanship divide with George Will weighing in on it.

Let's go to the audio sound bite.  He was on This Week. During the roundtable, George Stephanopoulos, said, "All of us were actually struck by what you wrote this week about football.  Pretty simple but staggering conclusion.  You write that football can't be fixed."  See, we've gotten to point, football needs to be fixed.  That's when it's over.  Football needs to be fixed.  Who says it needs to be?  Everybody playing the game knows what they're signing up for.  But, see, the liberals, "This is purposeful, disfiguring. This is permanent brain damage, and we're not a barbaric society.  We can't allow this. We can't have any risk."

Once football can't be fixed, once football can't be perfected -- I even heard Obama use the word, talking about our country and our Constitution.  It's imperfect, but it could be perfected.  That's liberal drivel.  The so-called march to perfection, as my buddy Mark Levin wrote, Ameritopia, which is a takeoff on utopia, this inexorable forward march to perfection.  But now they've determined football can't be perfected, can't be fixed.  Now, it's not just Will saying this.  People on the left came to this conclusion long before he wrote his piece.  It can't be fixed.  Who says it has to?  See, this is the point.  Somebody somewhere, I don't know if we're ever gonna find person zero in this, decided football needed to be fixed.  And I'll tell you who's gonna be responsible if this actually happens, as I'm predicting years from now, the media, the sports media, which thrives on the existence of the sport, I mean guys and women, sportswriters, telecasters, broadcasters, earn a living covering the sport, and they're the ones unwittingly -- well, I'll give you an example how.

One of the football websites that I read is ProFootballTalk.com.  It's a pretty good website.  It's run by a good guy named Mike Florio.  Now, you guys are all aware of the bounty punishments on the New Orleans Saints.  If you're not, I'm not gonna waste time bringing you up to speed.  Basically they suspended the coach for a year, maybe for life, because he was offering bounties to the players on his defense if they would commit injuries that forced guys out of the game, to be carted off, ambulanced out.  They've got it on tape.  There's arguments over whether it actually happened or whether  it was just motivational technique, but the coach's words are on tape so he's in trouble and a bunch of players have been suspended.  One of them is a guy named Jonathan Vilma, linebacker for the 'Aints suspended for a year.

Now, the Saints played the first preseason game last night against the Arizona Cardinals, and the Cardinals' first offensive series, their quarterback, Kevin Kolb, flushed out of the pocket, is tackled and a clean hit, pulled a muscle, chest injury or something, threw an interception, had to leave the game with an injury.  And you know how it's covered today?  That is the kind of legal hit that the Saints were being paid to make, according to the bounty.  The whole way the game is going to be covered now is going to change.  Here you had a tackle, nothing more than a tackle.  A guy pulled a muscle on a tackle, a quarterback flushed out of the pocket.  But, no, now it's gotta be reported.  That's the kind of hit that the Saints were legally engaging in and were exchanging dollars for.

The whole universe in which this game is now played and being reported on is forever changed.  The media will not be able to let this bounty thing go.  Every tackle, somebody on TV, "You think that would have been something that the Saints would have paid for?  Is that a legal hit or an illegal hit?  Do you think they were trying to put that guy out of the game?"  Once that stuff starts, there's no fixing that, either.  So here's George Will and Stephanopoulos says, "You write the game can't be fixed."

WILL:  The human body is no longer built for the kinetic energy of the National Football League and even further down to high school. In 1980, George, there were three NFL players over 300 pounds. Today there are three over 350 pounds, and 352 people on the 2011 rosters weighed more than 300 pounds. Over 20 yards, which is where a lot of football is played, these guys are as fast as cats, fast as running backs, and the kinetic energy is producing what is called chronic traumatic encephalopathy, CTE, get used to that, because it's going to be the subject of lawsuits and other things. The crucial word is "chronic." Repeated, small but repeated, blows to the head, the brain floating in the pan in the skull, now we know causes early dementia and other problems.

RUSH:  This is a Sunday morning political show, roundtable, This Week with George Stephanopoulos.  This is the roundtable on a political Sunday morning show discussing all of this stuff in football.  That football can't be fixed.  The Constitution can be, huh?  The Constitution can be fixed.  Football can't be fixed.  Let's throw hockey into the mix here.  Why football, folks?  Why is nobody wanting to ban hockey or UFC or boxing because of concussions or anything else, why?  Why only football?  And why is it now being said football can't be fixed?  And, say, once the plaintiff's bar gets involved here, and that's the tort lawyers, and there are massive lawsuits that have been filed... I don't know that I'm ever gonna be able to watch this game the same now.  I'm gonna have to turn the sound off, I guarantee you.

The commentary of this game is forever changed now. Everything will be looked at in the context of the Saints bounty program.  "You think that woulda been a hit that woulda fallen under the jurisdiction of the commissioner to levy a penalty?  That hit, what if that were a bounty program involved here?"  And then the analyst will weigh in on this, and then the highlight show.  You wait 'til the first quarterback or anybody hit with a concussion gets taken out of the game, it's gonna be covered almost like a gangland shooting is covered, like a crime's been committed, and how can we sit here and watch this and enjoy it?

Then wait 'til they get the racial component in it. Wait 'til they figure out that 75% of players are black and therefore 75% of the damage is being incurred by blacks and guess who's being entertained by it and guess who owns the teams.  Wait 'til that component gets thrown in.  Folks, I tell you it's gonna happen sooner than I thought and you're gonna end up saying, "Well, Rush knew what he was talking about."  And just like in the old SUV days, "We thought Rush had finally gone over the edge, but he hadn't.  Knows exactly what he's talking about." Because I know liberals.

Now, I don't know what George Will's doing. (sigh) It just shows it's crossed the boundary now. It's just crossed the partisan divide. Here's Stephanopoulos: "Well, so what's to be done about it, George, if it can't be fixed 'cause right now there's no evidence the American public is wanting to turn away from the game."

Ah, that's right! Now, that's the next thing to happen, folks. The next thing to happen is for efforts to be made to get you not to watch this barbaric bloodbath. To compare you to someone who's no different than the ancient Romans who gathered in the Colosseum to watch the Christians given to the lions.

You'll be no different than those bloodthirsty people back then. "How dare you want to watch something like this? How dare you pay to see it? It's just like a car race. You go there to see these injuries, don't you, you reprobate fans?" Stephanopoulos: "George, there's no evidence the American public is ready to turn away.

So what can be done about it?" See, now "something" needs to be done. Okay, that's where we are. That's where liberals take us: Something has to be done. Football needs to be fixed, but it can't be.
Here's George Will's answer...

WILL: It'll start down below. It'll start at the small level of kids playing football in grade school and then in high school. We now, in our hyper-cautious parenting, put crash helmets on children riding tricycles.
PANEL: (snickering)

WILL: How many of these parents are gonna let their children go out and play football once they learn -- again -- the chronic, the cumulative effect of small-brain trauma?

RUSH: There you have it, folks. There you have it. Okay. Great while it lasted. I'm glad that I lived the bulk of my life when football was what it was.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. This is Paul. Great to have you, sir. Welcome to the EIB Network.
CALLER: Hi, Rush. I wanted to comment on your take about the NFL. I think you may have it all wrong on this one, and rarely I disagree.

RUSH: I'm not surprised. I fully expect to be a lone wolf on this until it happens.

CALLER: This is my reasoning, Rush, and I'll tell you why. It's got to do with, they got a built-in protection with college football, and I say that because your instincts are right. There's gonna be a lot of hand-wringing and new ideas and liberal ideas and kook theories about changing football or getting rid of it. But the fact of the matter is college football is the huge source of revenue for the athletic department, and those athletic departments take that money and are giving it to sports like women's polo, table tennis, badminton.

RUSH: I understand all that.

CALLER: These colleges fly these girls teams around from state college to, say, Notre Dame for a badminton competition.

RUSH: I'm not predicting that the game's gonna be banned. That's not how this is going to happen. They're not gonna ban the game. What's gonna happen -- and I don't know how many years it's gonna take, but -- is it's going to eventually lose (slowly but surely) its fans, its audience. There's going to be a deterioration at all levels. I'll be happy to detail how I think this is going to manifest itself. It's already begun. It's already begun. "Football can't be fixed. There's something inexorably wrong about it." It does generate a lot of money, but, remember: The liberal left on college campi hate that.

But that's only a minor factor.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Look, I know I'm all alone on my prediction about what's gonna happen with football. And as the program unfolds, maybe if anybody asks me anything further about it, I'll tell you how I think this all is gonna happen. There's not gonna be a ban. That wouldn't work. Everybody knows it wouldn't work. There wouldn't be a ban. Fans love the game too much. So the people that want this game banned, the people that want it gotten rid of -- which is silly because it's a cash cow for so many people, but we're talking liberals, now. Look at how popular boxing used to be. Look at how popular smoking used to be.

Tort lawyers got involved in both. Tort lawyers are involved here now. Liberals are involved: "Game needs to be fixed. Game can't be fixed, though. Oh, it can't be fixed!" Mike Ditka says you can't take the hits out of it. Take the face mask off, Ditka says! You want to stop head injuries, take the face mask off. There are all kinds of ideas like that. That's not gonna satisfy. Once the game "needs to be fixed," that's it. So how are the people that want this game irreparably harmed going to pull it off?

I know how they're gonna do it.

They're gonna make you sick and tired of watching it.

And if you want further details, I'll provide 'em. But there's other stuff going on out there that I want to weigh in on.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH:  Okay, here, folks, right here.  Right here, just got it, Wall Street Journal.  Headline:  "Is It Time to Retire the Football Helmet?"  Yes, my friends, the march is on.

END TRANSCRIPT

Link:

• The End of Football Fast Approaches

Witches in Massachusetts Hold Seance to End Tim Tebow's Season

Dec. 11, 2011: Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow (15) prays in the end zone before the start of an NFL football game against the Chicago Bears, Sunday - AP Photo/Julie Jacobson

(Fox News) New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady may not need the help, but some witches are planning to cast a spell to put an end to Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow’s miraculous season.

Witches Lorelei and Lori Bruno were scheduled to hold a seance at noon today – Friday the 13th – at Haven Crow Corner in Salem, Mass. to fix a win for the Pats.

“I’m going to raise the energy of the universe and send out all the good mojo,” Lorelei told the Boston Herald. “Lori will call in the Angels.”

The good witches won’t hex Tebow, as it’s “not their way,” but plan on setting up an altar with a hand-sewn Brady puppet and mojo bags filled with herbs and stones for every Patriots team member.

At the altar, the witches will chant, “Tom Brady will see what he needs to see, be where he needs to be and will take the Patriots to another victory.”

Hunky QB Brady, married to supermodel Gisele Bundchen, is a bigger draw for the witches of Salem than another recent marquee recipient of their spells, Charlie Sheen.

“You know, when we had our spiritual intervention for Charlie Sheen last year, we had a hard time getting all the girls to come,” laughed Lorelei. “But when we told them this Circle was for Tom Brady, oh, everybody will be there!”

“We want the true champion to come out on Saturday night,” Bruno added. “But since we live in Patriot Land, it’s red, white and blue and make the dream come true!”

• Link

Top 10 Indianapolis Colts Excuses

Drew Brees with Son at the Super Bowl

Cathy at the Super Bowl

The Race Card, Football and Me

My critics would have you believe no conservative meets NFL 'standards.'

By RUSH LIMBAUGH

David Checketts, an investor and owner of sports teams, approached me in late May about investing in the St. Louis Rams football franchise. As a football fan, I was intrigued. I invited him to my home where we discussed it further. Even after informing him that some people might try to make an issue of my participation, Mr. Checketts said he didn't much care. I accepted his offer.

It didn't take long before my name was selectively leaked to the media as part of the Checketts investment group. Shortly thereafter, the media elicited comments from the likes of Al Sharpton. In 1998 Mr. Sharpton was found guilty of defamation and ordered to pay $65,000 for falsely accusing a New York prosecutor of rape in the 1987 Tawana Brawley case. He also played a leading role in the 1991 Crown Heights riot (he called neighborhood Jews "diamond merchants") and 1995 Freddie's Fashion Mart riot.

Not to be outdone, Jesse Jackson, whose history includes anti-Semitic speech (in 1984 he referred to Jews as "Hymies" and to New York City as "Hymietown" in a Washington Post interview) chimed in. He found me unfit to be associated with the NFL. I was too divisive and worse. I was accused of once supporting slavery and having praised Martin Luther King Jr.'s murderer, James Earl Ray.

Next came writers in the sports world, like the Washington Post's Michael Wilbon. He wrote this gem earlier this week: "I'm not going to try and give specific examples of things Limbaugh has said over the years because I screwed up already doing that, repeating a quote attributed to Limbaugh (about slavery) which he has told me he simply did not say and does not reflect his feelings. I take him at his word. . . . "

Mr. Wilbon wasn't alone. Numerous sportswriters, CNN, MSNBC, among others, falsely attributed to me statements I had never made. Their sources, as best I can tell, were Wikipedia and each other. But the Wikipedia post was based on a fabrication printed in a book that also lacked any citation to an actual source.

I never said I supported slavery and I never praised James Earl Ray. How sick would that be? Just as sick as those who would use such outrageous slanders against me or anyone else who never even thought such things. Mr. Wilbon refuses to take responsibility for his poison pen, writing instead that he will take my word that I did not make these statements; others, like Rick Sanchez of CNN, essentially used the same sleight-of-hand.

The sports media elicited comments from a handful of players, none of whom I can recall ever meeting. Among other things, at least one said he would never play for a team I was involved in given my racial views. My racial views? You mean, my belief in a colorblind society where every individual is treated as a precious human being without regard to his race? Where football players should earn as much as they can and keep as much as they can, regardless of race? Those controversial racial views?

The NFL players union boss, DeMaurice Smith, jumped in. A Washington criminal defense lawyer, Democratic Party supporter and Barack Obama donor, he sent a much publicized email to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell saying that it was important for the league to reject discrimination and hatred.

When Mr. Goodell was asked about me, he suggested that my 2003 comment criticizing the media's coverage of Donovan McNabb—in which I said the media was cheerleading Mr. McNabb because they wanted a successful black quarterback—fell short of the NFL's "high standard." High standard? Half a decade later, the media would behave the same way about the presidential candidacy of Mr. Obama.

Having brought me into his group, Mr. Checketts now wanted a way out. He asked me to resign. I told him no way. I had done nothing wrong. I had not uttered the words these people were putting in my mouth. And I would not bow to their libels and pressure. He would have to drop me from the group. A few days later, he did.

As I explained on my radio show, this spectacle is bigger than I am on several levels. There is a contempt in the news business, including the sportswriter community, for conservatives that reflects the blind hatred espoused by Messrs. Sharpton and Jackson. "Racism" is too often their sledgehammer. And it is being used to try to keep citizens who don't share the left's agenda from participating in the full array of opportunities this nation otherwise affords each of us. It was on display many years ago in an effort to smear Clarence Thomas with racist stereotypes and keep him off the Supreme Court. More recently, it was employed against patriotic citizens who attended town-hall meetings and tea-party protests.

These intimidation tactics are working and spreading, and they are a cancer on our society.

Mr. Limbaugh is a nationally syndicated talk radio host.

• Link

Favre Returns to Packers

"Sixteen years after Brett Favre came to the Packers, he is returning for a seventeenth season. He has had a great career with our organization and although we built this year around the assumption that Brett meant what he said about retiring, Brett is coming back. We will welcome him back and turn this situation to our advantage..."

More

Update:

Source says Packers contacted Vikings about trade for Favre

"GREEN BAY, Wis. — The Green Bay Packers welcomed back quarterback Brett Favre from the reserve-retired list Sunday knowing full well that they've already taken the first step toward trading him to the Minnesota Vikings...

The contact by the Packers was termed "a feeler" in the event Favre rejected the multimillion-dollar marketing and promotional agreement offered by Green Bay.

"They thought he would agree to it," the executive said. "Evidently, he didn't agree to it..."

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In high-stakes poker vs. Favre, Green Bay can't win

By Gene Wojciechowski
ESPN.comBrett Favre, left, wants to play again, but Packers GM Ted Thompson won't release him.

The World Series of Poker isn't being played in Las Vegas. It's being played in Green Bay, Wis., and Hattiesburg, Miss. And so far, a very amateurish Ted Thompson is trying to show strength in his hand.

Feel free to laugh the next time Green Bay Packers management, both past and present, starts talking about "preserving" Brett Favre's legacy and cherishing Favre's place in the team's "family." It means nothing.

The Packers are about the Packers, and that's fine, even expected, but at least say so from the beginning. Don't pretend you're genuinely concerned about Favre's standing in franchise lore when, in reality, you're more concerned about damage and image control.

Favre wants to unretire. And yeah, it's a bit of a diva-ish thing to do. Tears in March. Text messages in July.

But Favre has earned his share of diva currency, enough for one Get Out Of Retirement card. He's played hurt. He's played with his heart heavy with grief. And he's played for the moment, not the money. There are bits and pieces of his body all over Lambeau Field.

Thompson, the Packers' general manager, doesn't see it that way. His solution -- and remember, the Packers are the self-appointed guardians of Favre's football reputation -- is to announce that one of the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history, the guy only seven months removed from the NFC Championship Game, can return but may be a second-stringer. Think about it: Favre wearing a baseball cap and holding a clipboard.

Some legacy.

Packers management wants it both ways. It says it wants to protect Favre from himself, but mostly it wants to protect Favre from becoming a free agent, signing with the Minnesota Vikings and possibly kicking the Packers' butts twice in the regular season. That's the reason behind not granting Favre his release -- nothing else...

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Can priests save Italian football's soul?

By Danny Robins

Like most of the nation, I shed a few tears and consigned myself to a summer of misery when England failed to qualify for Euro 2008. Then, I read about an alternative football tournament happening not in Austria or Switzerland, but in the world's smallest country - Vatican City.

This year, 72 nations were represented among the 18 teams taking part

As the son of a lapsed Catholic and a bit of a lapsed playground footballer myself, I was intrigued.

The Clericus Cup is like no other football tournament. The players are all trainee priests, drawn from Rome's seminary colleges.

Seventy two nations are represented among the 18 teams taking part, including Ukraine, Iraq, Malta, Zimbabwe, Swaziland, Papua New Guinea, Brazil and England.

The teams pray together before games and there is a strict code of sportsmanship - where fair play is more important than winning.

As one of the British players told me: "It's about competing, but competing in the right manner."

The tournament is the brainchild of Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone - the Vatican's secretary of state, effectively the Pope's number two. The 73-year-old Bertone is a lifelong Juventus fan. During his time as Archbishop of Genoa, he used to commentate on matches on local radio.

International dreams

At a press conference in late 2006, Bertone announced to the world's media that he dreamed of a time when the Vatican had their own football team.

Kickoff for the 2007 tournament in the shadow of St Peter's Dome

"If we just take the Brazilian students from our Pontifical universities we could have a magnificent squad," he said.

"The Vatican could, in future, field a team that plays at the top level, with Roma, Inter Milan, Genoa and Sampdoria."

In theory, the Vatican could one day field its own team on the international stage. In the meantime though, Bertone has contented himself with organising the Clericus Cup.

The competition's slogan is "un altro calcio e possible" - a different football is possible.

The values of the tournament stand as a stark contrast to Italian professional football, which has been plagued by corruption and violence in recent years.

In May 2006, some of Italy's biggest clubs, including Juventus, AC Milan and Lazio, became embroiled in a match-fixing scandal that saw Juventus relegated as punishment to Serie B, the second tier of Italian football.

Then in February 2007, a policeman was murdered in violence between football fans and police. Nine months later a Lazio fan was shot accidentally by a policeman, sparking furious protests by fans against the police.

All these events were continuations of old themes in Italian football - excellence on the pitch but corruption, greed, violence and hate off it.

Code of conduct

The Church has now taken on the role of cleaning up football - going as far as getting involved in the running of a team.

Danny Robins with members of the philosophical British team

The Centro Sportivo Italiano, a Vatican-backed Catholic sports association, became involved with AC Ancona, a once successful team which had fallen on hard times.

The CSI brought in a new code of conduct for the team, which included players having to do community service as punishment for any red or yellow cards. On the plus side, they did get to meet the Pope.

The relationship between the Church and football is well established in Italy. The two are intertwined in the lives of children from an early age - most Italian kids play their first calcio at a church run youth club.

I asked a range of people I met which was more important to Italians, God or football. Their answers were split roughly down the middle.

Journalist and broadcaster Paddy Agnew, an expert on Italian football summed it up well:

"Ninety-six percent of Italians are nominal Catholics, but the same 96% are committed football fans."

It is tempting to view the Clericus Cup as a cynical attempt by the "old religion" to get some free advertising on the back of the "new religion', but the truth of the matter is that in Italy, everyone loves football, priests included.

Discipline

I arrived in Rome in April in time for the semi-finals of the Clericus Cup. On first glimpse, the astroturf pitch at the edge of town seemed a little underwhelming, but then, as I walked round the side of the pitch, I was struck by the most amazing vista - the pitch overlooks St Peter's Dome.

It is the most immediate and compelling reminder of what this tournament is all about.

The players range in age from those almost straight from school to the tournament's oldest player, 57 year old John Breen, Dean of Studies at Beda College.

The whole idea, not to get too heavy, is the idea of sport bringing the finer qualities out of humanity, like humility in victory and gracious in defeat Tony Preston, British team captain

There are also slightly different rules regarding discipline. You might be forgiven for thinking that yellow and red cards would be unnecessary in a tournament of trainee priests, but there were four red cards in this year's tournament - two for verbal abuse and one for a priest from Burkina Faso who threw his shirt at a referee.

"You get a bit of back chat, couple of tantrums and people storming off, but that's to be expected in the heat of the moment," said Francis, one of the British players.

There is the further innovation of a blue card, which, when shown to a player, sends him off to a 'sin bin' for five minutes to contemplate what he has done, and perhaps ask for absolution.

The teams pray before the match, but as tournament organiser Felice Alborghetti told me:

"All teams pray to the same God so he can have no favourites."

The fans are, to say the least, vocal. The American team from the Pontifical North American College, or PNAC, had one of the largest supports.

Nicknamed the Knackers, they were led by a priest in a cowboy hat. Their fans favourite chant is a rousing "Come on you Knackers, kick some Caboose."

The Americans seemed pretty confident, as one of their midfielders said:

"When you love God you can't lose." They lost 4-0.

The British team had already been eliminated by semi-final stage. In a horrible echo of Euro 2008 qualifying, they lost to a team of Croatian priests. Tony Preston, the team's captain seemed pretty philosophical:

"The whole idea, not to get too heavy, is the idea of sport bringing the finer qualities out of humanity, like humility in victory and gracious in defeat - we've got a bit of experience in that."

It's hard not to admire a tournament that sets out in a spirit of fair play. Perhaps the professional game could learn a thing or two from these priests.

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