Poll: Your favourite SPECTATOR sport

[Colour Scientist]

There's no option for rugby.

Well, that.

Oh, that and equestrian sports, especially show-jumping. Unfortunately, I can't afford my own horse.

[sub]Horses are so fucking awesome[/sub]

 

[Melon Hunter]

Rugby! Or more specifically, rugby union. Give me that over a football match any day. More interesting to watch, and when going to see it a stadium, it just feels friendlier than a football match.

 

[Aris Khandr]

I do believe my avatar says it all for me.

Football will do me just fine.

My avatar speaks for me more than sufficiently on this subject, as well. But I'll have to change it to Arsenal once Euro is over.

 

[repeating integers]

DEATH

[small](good games of English football can be fun)[/small]

 

[Lang901]

Other:
Policy Debate. Though you need a special kind of spectator.

 

[SckizoBoy]

What the? No baseball? No ice hockey? but you have cricket? C'mon cricket is played in arguably two places. The other two have leagues all over the world.

Y'know, I really should be offended by that, but when I read that, I was most amused... like a good English boy that I am.

Anyway, cricket is played professionally in all of the test-playing nations (seven), but I like to think that in the UK, it is the only (relatively) high-profile sport whose image hasn't been completely ruined by money (considering the pittance pro players earn - something like GBP25000 a season or something, this is a sport that, unless you're in the England squad, you play purely because you enjoy it, not for the money). Debatably, baseball has much lower professional international coverage (I mean that geographically, not televised) and with much less consistency, but I'm probably wrong... I guess that much of cricket's lack of appeal 'to the masses' is its lack of accessibility (fuck using a tennis ball!) and the fact that it's widely viewed as a public-schoolboy sport (despite prior comment that pro-players in the UK earn sweet fuck all).

OT: For all I hate how commercialised it's become, I love disseminating football matches, and I luckily support one of the Premiership's perennial overachievers.

 

[Dragonclaw]

NFL all the way for me I also like Baseball, but ONLY if I'm at the game...I just can't watch it on TV

 

[Sandernista]

Other:
Policy Debate. Though you need a special kind of spectator.

+1

OT: I'll be honest, I'm partial to American Football.

My father owned a college football magazine so we got to go around the country and go to any games. It was awesome. We even got to sit up in the press box at Soldier Field!

 

[Saulkar]

Hockey and Rally Racing, none of which are on that poll.

 

[EternalFacepalm]

Can I say StarCraft 2? I like spectating that, at any rate.

Most other sports are just boring as hell to me.

 

[doggy go 7]

EDIT: Sigh the poll has committed suicide and was also supposed to include Rugby, Baseball and Other. (If a mod could fix it - not sure if you can - that'd be great)

I imgine if you edit the original post there should be an option to add stuff.

OT: football all the way, I have a local team (arsenal), which makes it better instantly, and when it's done well, it produces some of the most shocking results of any sport.

 

[applesandoranges]

edit

 

[doggy go 7]

What the? No baseball? No ice hockey? but you have cricket? C'mon cricket is played in arguably two places. The other two have leagues all over the world.

I think you'll find that is precisely the other way round. Cricket is played in every former English colony (btw, there are a lot of former English colonies), whilst I only know of Scandinavian countries and Canada as the two places that do ice hockey seriously, and the US and Japan that do baseball (in the UK, some people play softball at school, but there isn't a national interest in it).

Capatcha: that's it. how appropriate

 

[loc978]

Kind of a hard decision between extreme obstacle courses (a la Sasuke [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sasuke_(TV_series)]), mixed martial arts, and Olympic fencing.

...not fond of team sports.

 

[The Funslinger]

My favourite type of match is if a 'typical Dutchman' (who isn't necessarily a Dutch person, it's a fight style) goes up against someone who doesn't follow that style. Dutch kickboxing tends to emphasize lowkicks to the legs, and people unprepared for that often try to find holes in the defense as their legs slowly get chopped out from underneath them. If such a dynamic unfolds it's a joy to watch.

That's the same tactic I've often employed in sword fighting.

Nobody ever blocks their legs, or as the footwork to compensate for a top heavy guard style these days.

 

[gigastar]

Fighting game tournaments.

Yes, its a sport [www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCzLfYlIcGg&feature=results_main&playnext=1&list=PL1473268F93713E71].

 

[Moderated]

I don't get the appeal of watching other people have fun and play a game.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Probably tennis, providing the right players are playing. Seeing Nadal play is just genius for example, but I just can't get excited over women's tennis. But seriously, the last Roland Garros semi-finals and the finale. Bloody brilliant.

I'm also learning to appreciate the odd game of football/soccer. When my national team is playing, that is. Not that that made me happy, watching the last two matches...

Other than that there's rugby which is pretty fun, snowboard racing (not sure what it's called exactly), rally driving and baseball. But we don't get all that on telly here very often.

 

[Plinglebob]

Rugby for entertainment, Cricket for relaxing.

Rugby I enjoy more due to the physical comedy then caring about who wins. Nothing more entertaining then when the ref stops play in the middle of a 5 man huddle with everyone's limbs out at odd angles and them all having to remain perfectly still. One of the best nights I've had watching sport was with a South African friend watching the Rugby World Cup final a few years ago.

Cricket on the other hand is probably the most gentlemanly of sports (its an all white kit that is clean at the end of the day for crying out loud) and there's something soothing about the "Thwack" of the ball on the bat and everyone politely clapping.

 

[ace_of_something]

What the? No baseball? No ice hockey? but you have cricket? C'mon cricket is played in arguably two places. The other two have leagues all over the world.

I think you'll find that is precisely the other way round. Cricket is played in every former English colony (btw, there are a lot of former English colonies), whilst I only know of Scandinavian countries and Canada as the two places that do ice hockey seriously, and the US and Japan that do baseball (in the UK, some people play softball at school, but there isn't a national interest in it).

Capatcha: that's it. how appropriate

Hockey also has an austrian-german league, a swiss league, a russian league which the NHL poaches players from all of them .
Considering they are all very different nations as opposed to 'former colonies' I think it speaks to being more popular.
Baseball is also making ground in china not as much as basketball but yeah. Tons of countries in central america, cuba and a few in south america also have large to small leagues.

So to me whereas every country has a direct line back to England wheras ice hockey and baseball take place in fairly different demographic places. I think they're a bit more popular.

That and the fact that the USA alone is half the population of Europe as a whole. Anything we like instantly has a lot more numbers behind it.

Though I appreciate the nod to American Football. WE call world football, soccer because it's short for asSOCiation football. Also you DO kick in our Football it's called punting and fieldgoals. I think if we called it 'Runball' or something it just wouldn't've sounded as good.