They really should double the size of the goals, or at least increase them by 50 percent, stop the clock during injuries to eliminate the moronic "injury time" and run the clock downwards to zero each half, instead of upwards towards infinity (which is how long some games actually feel) to give the fans a chance to count down the closing seconds of a victory.

Purists would hate it, but a game that asks you to spend 90-plus minutes in your seat with a good chance of never once seeing your team get on the scoreboard is never going to make inroads in the U.S. (and remember how panicked baseball got after all those 1-0 and 2-1 games in 1968? Major rule changes came out of that offensive slump, and the world kept spinning on its axis).

Whereas if you watched the Cubs-White Sox on Saturday, you would have seen a heart-breaking 9th inning loss by the Cubs. If you watched the Sunday Cubs-White Sox game, you would have seen a 15-11 slugfest. You want to talk about offense (or perhaps bad pitching?), yesterday produced: Yankees-Mets 16-7, Detroit-Pirates 9-8, St. Louis-KC 9-7, a late inning 4-3 Red Sox victory over the Marlins, and a player stealing home in the Angels-Dodgers game.

Or they could allow unlimited substitution, as hockey does, so that we don't see the spectacle (as in the Brazil-France game) of some superstar close to collapse from exhaustion on the field. (And to take another key from hockey, instead of all these stupid cards, how about in-game suspension instead of defering it to the next game?)

Otherwise in these championship series they should cut out the 120 minutes of running in circles and skip right to the penalty shootout, which is the equivalent of baseball deciding games based on Homerun Derbies (glorified batting practice).

Absolute truth: I spent part of Friday listening to a cricket match on BBC Internet. It was the Twenty20 form of the game - don't ask me to explain, but it doesn't have anything to do with eyesight. The whole game only takes about two-and-a-half hours, not much longer than the typical soccer match.

The game went down to the final ball. Glamorgan beat Somerset by one run: 186 to 185.

My kind of game, and the sellout crowd bounced onto the pitch after the match. Makes 0-0 soccer look pretty silly, even in the homeland of the "beautiful game" itself.

I watched the second half of the Germany-Argentina match last week (company lunch outing... Hey, it's a free lunch!). Being the uninitiated that I am, my views may not be quite correct, but I felt that Arg. played a far better game overall. Ger, however, got off one very nice shot (double-header into the net), tying the game. It went into double OT, then penalty kicks, where Ger. thrashed the Arg. backup goalie (err keeper?). To see what I thought was the obviously better team lose because of one sweet shot confirmed in my mind that soccer is not a sport I want to spend my time on.

Let 'em use their hands. Grab the ball, and run with it.

Peter:

When I tell Archer not to touch the toaster because it's hot he immediately does so anyway. He's four. What's your excuse?

"Grab the ball, and run with it."

The mythical beginning of rugby. Honest. Google "William Webb Ellis."

As I've said elesewhere, going to a soccer game is like going to Churchill Downs to watch the jockies play an endless game of kick the can in the infield.

The two travesties on Saturday were a bit more watchable on the Spanish networks. Their announcers are obviously leaping out of their chairs in ecstatic anticipation of the brilliance sure to erupt at any moment. Although it never actually does, their enthusiasm is quite contagious and keeps the viewer awake, at least.

Orrin:

Some days I need to get in touch with my inner child.