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Super silly us

Examples of things with the prefix 'super' not being very good at all are endless

Peter Edgerton

Friday, 14 May 2021, 11:28

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Let's face it, supermarkets aren't all that super at all; everybody knows that real markets are infinitely better places to be. Similarly, Superman isn't a particularly outstanding or popular hero - in fact, Spiderman consistently knocks him into a cocked hat in all the appropriate polls. Meanwhile the Super Bowl is, as a far as I can tell, just a load of TV adverts, occasionally interrupted by some very big blokes in dodgy shoulder pads bashing their heads together. Examples of things with the prefix 'super' not being very good at all, then, are endless.

That's why it should come as no surprise to learn that football's latest hare-brained, money-grabbing scheme, which proposed a separate competition for Europe's wealthiest clubs, was given the name The Super League by its proponents. They're quite clearly as unimaginative as they are greedy. I much prefer the description of the plan touted in Everton football club's official statement on the matter, which described it as an act of "preposterous arrogance". It would have been quite brilliant if it had been called The Preposterous Arrogance League, or PAL for short. The irony being, of course, that the teams involved would never have any pals or, indeed, fans by the time they were done, judging by the public outcry the proposal caused.

Real Madrid's president, Florentino Pérez, a key mover and shaker in the whole sorry business (it wouldn't be a show without Punch) suggested - we can only presume with a straight face - that such a change would "save soccer". Leaving aside the fact that anyone who uses the word "soccer" to talk about football - even when it's via a translator - isn't fit to be involved in the game, a bloke worth 2.3 billion US dollars should not, I think, be preaching to the common man about what might be good for his favourite sport.

No, what might "save soccer", Señor Pérez, is a reduction in top players' astronomical wages and a modicum of humility on the part of the myriad nefarious characters in expensive, ill-fitting suits who appear to spend every second of every day rubbing their hands together in a miserly fashion, while attempting to squeeze every last miserable cent of profitability out of what is, in its purest form, a quite magnificent sport.

The prefix 'super' comes from the Latin meaning above, over or beyond.

Beyond parody, in this particular case.

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