Theme Week, Part 4

Jeremy's Sametime Status Proudly Presents:  Soccer Improvements Week!  #2 - Use an actual Stadium Clock

Before we begin, Jeremy and I would like to congratulate the Los Angeles Kings for their dramatic victory in Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Finals to win their first NHL championship in franchise history.  By "dramatic victory," we mean, of course, "Good Old-Fashioned Beatdown of the New Jersey Devils."

So Theme Week continues today with the second in a series of improvements to the game of Soccer which would make the game more accessible to today's sporting audience.  Today's suggestion is simple: use a stadium clock to keep the game time.

Soccer games last 90 minutes, plus whatever time the ref sees fit to stop the clock due to injuries and whatnot.  Many of you probably know that in a game of soccer, there is only one person on the field, in the stadium, or watching on TV who knows when the game is going to end.  The only official record of the time is on the referee's wrist, and when he decides the game is over, he blows the whistle.  He does not tell anyone in advance exactly how much time is remaining at any given time.  Many of you don't know that this practice goes back to the days before clocks, when the only way to tell the time was by the passage of the sun.  The referee would determine at which position on a sideline sundial the game would end and rule the game accordingly. 

You're ruining your credibility here...

We've since come so far as to have somebody announce approximately how much "stoppage time" is left after everyone else thinks that 90 minutes have passed, though how that information is gleaned from the ref is a mystery on the order of the "Magic Spray" used to treat soccer injuries.  Regardless, nowadays, we actually have clocks with the express purpose of timing sporting events.  Referees can stop and start them at will, and there are even officials whose duty it is to make sure those clocks are accurate.  There is no reason not to use this in soccer.  

If they still want to use the goofy backwards clock which counts from 0:00 to 90:00, that's fine...we can figure that part out, but to have there be no clues as to how much time is actually left in the game is absurd.  It deprives people of the suspense and action that can accompany the last minute of a game when victory is on the line and one team is frantically trying to tie the score.  You want to add that level of drama and intrigue to the game?  Add a real game clock.