Soccer is a matter of life and death

Category: Water Cooler

Bill Shankly, a former Liverpool FC manager, said: “Some people think football is a matter of life and death. I don’t like that attitude. I can assure them it is much more serious than that.” Unfortunately, his quote is very true to the many players who have lost their lives.

Abdon Porte
Abdon Porte, who played for the Uruguayan team Nacional, was a great midfielder. However, as his performance began to diminish over time, he was taken out of the starting lineup. In 1918, after a game Nacional won 3-1, in which Porte actually played and performed well in, he decided to kill himself. In the early hours of the morning, he stood in the center of the stadium and shot himself.

FC Start
Germany had launched a major offensive against the old Soviet Union in 1941 and eventually occupied the Ukrainian capital of Kiev. The Germans decided to have a bit of fun and started up a soccer league allowing locals to play. FC Start, which was a team made up of local bakery workers, were dominating the league crushing one opponent after the other. Even though they were warned and threatened to be killed, they continued to win the rest of their games. The Germans eventually took the players away, interrogated and tortured them, and some were eventually killed.

Andres Escobar
During the 1994 FIFA World Cup, the United States was playing against Columbia. Andres Escobar, a defender for Columbia, unfortunately scored on his own net and Columbia lost the game. Not long after the game, Andres was shot dead outside a bar in Medellin, Columbia. According to his girlfriend, the killer shouted “Gooooaaaal” for each shot fired. Some say drug lords had bet large amounts of money on the game, and because of Escobar’s own goal, Columbia lost the game. Many speculate that was the reason why he was murdered.