rather dear, but since he has gotten this far, he says he must keep going to find out just how good he can be. Watching a football match is not just a matter of observation. It is a matter of passion. While I was traveling through Scandinavia last summer, Will invited a group of us to watch a midsummer “friendly,” a training match, between FC Kobenhavn and the Celtic Football Club from Glasgow, Scotland. In the world of football, Celtic is world famous, FC Kobenhavn only less so. Will had debuted for FCK during the previous April and had played in three games, but a broken toe in June had brought his season to an end. I enjoyed myself immensely, but Will was almost in agony. That was his club on the field, and he was relegated to the sideline. Football stadiums in the United States are massive affairs where sixty to eighty thousand people watch from quite a distance. Most European stadiums are much smaller, more intimate places that allow fans to see the action on the field from almost the sideline. FC Kobenhavn dashed to an early lead when the club’s top striker found half a step, an open look, and an extra three seconds to spot the ball behind an out-of-position goalkeeper. Celtic began a concerted effort in the second half to control the ball, and the pressure exerted against the Danish defenders led to a 2–2 draw at the end of regulation time. The crowd roared until the last minute; I don’t remember seeing fans leave early. Professional football is as cutthroat as any other sport, and recently Will found himself riding the pine more often than he wanted to. He found himself “on loan” this fall to a rival club in Viborg, a small town in the middle of Denmark’s northern peninsula. Will played well and returned to Kobenhavn determined to do even better, but in the same way that many baseball players travel from team to team, so has Will. Now with the Olstykke Foot-
Back on the fields at Taft, Will—nicknamed “Silk”—learned about the expression of oneself through individual play and through sacrifice to the whole of the team. PETER FREW ’75
ball Club, Will has a greater opportunity to demonstrate his skills, but Olstykke is a first division club fighting off reassignment to the second division, not powerful FC Kobenhavn of the Superligaen. Why keep going? The beauty of the game occurs “when the ball seems to be where you want it all the time, and as a player you seem to possess the power to make it do whatever you like,” Will said. “The thrill of this mastery, this control, is what I enjoy most in football. The game and the ball are normally moving in chaos, but there are times when vision and skill combine magically to slice through the jumble with remarkable directness and efficiency. It is like a perfect circle drawn through a series of scattered points. These timeless instances of distinction and clarity inspire the team and the individual; the experience they provide is like no other I can name.” Finding that balance between playing the game for love and playing the game for a living is often difficult, but Will again credits Willy MacMullen for helping him keep perspective. “Mr. Mac’s
coaching focus was always about the expression of oneself through individual play and through sacrifice to the whole of the team. This may not sound so novel, but the further and further I have gone in football, the less and less I hear about this side of the game. The more money and exposure involved with the game, the more we hear about playing dependable, clinical, and professional football. It is all about winning and losing, and it is that simple. The expressive and human side of football is up to us, as professionals, to handle on our own.” Rick Lansdale is a member of the English Department, a soccer and lacrosse coach, and director of the Independent Studies Program. He visited Will while on a studytravel grant from Taft last summer. To learn more about Will’s latest soccer activities, check out his team’s website at www.olstykke-fodbold.dk. That is, if you’re fluent in Danish, as Will now is. He tells us a switch to another team might be in the works, so stay tuned.
Taft Bulletin Summer 2001
25