Oh, no! Not another Soccer post!

I know. Soccer is an acquired taste. I get that. So you can skip this one if you want to, but the FIFA Confederation Cup is going on. Group play was this past week and the quarter-finals begin today. I'm loving it. 

The Confederation Cup is sort of a dry-run for next year's World Cup - the big one. Held in the World Cup host country, it gives FIFA and the host nation - in this instance, Brazil - a chance to see if everything is ready. Or will be ready. With the spotlight on Brazil, hundreds of thousands of protesters are taking advantage of the world's attention to demonstrate against the government. "Millions to spend on soccer stadiums, but no money for services." FIFA is a tetch worried.

Fewer teams compete in this competition; the participants are made up of the reigning World Cup champions (Spain), the host nation (Brazil), and the current holders of each of the six FIFA confederation championships. Normally, these are big name national teams, like Italy, Uruguay, Japan, Mexico, Nigeria...and Tahiti. Here's a team picture. Okay, maybe not.

 Yes, Tahiti - ranked 138th in the world - but in the tournament by virtue of having won the Oceania Football Confederation title by surprising New Caledonia in the Oceania tournament final! To give you some sense of scale, think a parks and rec football team playing the Pittsburgh Steelers. Every three days.

The players on national teams are professional soccer players; they do this for a living. For example, the players on Spain's National Team earn annually an average of about $7 million dollars each (Fernando Torres earns $17 million all by himself). By contrast, the players on that Pittsburgh Steelers team earn an average of $2.9 million. Tahiti has one professional player, who earned $1.5 million last year. The rest of the team plays amateur club soccer and support themselves as best they can, as teachers, truck drivers and such. Nine are currently employed.

So, how did they do? The final count for 3 games was 24 goals to 1. They did score a goal, and their keeper stopped a penalty kick. And the crowds loved them! This week in Brazil, they were Rock Stars!

Speaking of scoring goals... Abby Wambach needed but two goals to match all-time top scorer Mia Hamm. The US team played South Korea in a "friendly" last week and Abby got her two goals - and two more for good measure. I guess that's a hat trick with a feather stuck in it. The four goals gave Wambach a total of 160 international goals in 207 games, two more than Hamm had in her 275-game career that ended in 2004. By comparison, Ali Daie of Iran holds the men's record with 109. Not too shabby.