What is Missing from the Olympics

Missed the closing ceremonies for the London Games, and have to say I did not see much of the 2012 Olympiad, However all the athletes who attended should be proud of themselves.

However to me in many of the competitions something seemed to be missing... It took me a while to pin it down then it came to me.

I was reminded of a great story from the 2011 Stanley Cup Finals. After Vancouver won the first two games at home the series moved to Boston where the Bruins dominated both games. After one of the games the Vancouver players went out for a team dinner in Boston, the restaurant owner upon finding out they were players from the Vancouver Canucks refused to serve them and actually said the restaurant was "out of food", the Vancouver players left hungry and crestfallen I’m sure.

You can call this petty or small minded, you can call it pride in your home town and your team, or you can just call it hatred. Temporary hate for an opponent, but hatred none the less. You battle hard, play on the edge of the rule book and when it's all over you line up and shake hands.

From the limited amount of what I saw - with the exception of the Canada/US soccer game - this emotion seemed to be lacking in The Games. Countries were way too polite to each other (it was before my time but in the 1950's when Hungary played the Soviet Union in water polo the Hungarians were furious at the 1956 Soviet invasion of their homeland and it was war in the pool! There was literally blood in the water when it was over - that game really meant something to Hungarian pride and it showed in their furious and passionate play).

Now technically at that time Hungary and the USSR were Warsaw Pact Allies arrayed against NATO and the West. However it is a truism that for some strange reason, countries that are political, military and economic allies seem to have the fiercest rivalries. The same for cities take the New York Rangers, New Jersey Devils rivalry, situated across a river from each other there have been times when blood was being scraped off the ice five minutes into the game. You can be sure no one left their seats for popcorn during those on ice fireworks.

I don't know if in any team sport this Olympics if the UK played any team sports against the United States or France. Brits go on constantly about a "special relationship" with The United States, which many Americans frankly just don't get. For Heaven's sake the two countries were actually making plans to go to war against each other until the 1930's!

If I were the American team I'd save any praise for London until after the games were over and they were back home, I'd bar any UK athletes from the US Olympic Village, refuse to lower the Stars and Stripes for the queen (I mean what was the Revolution about anyway?), and generally talk smack about Britain being an old has been of a country pining for a lost empire and sucking up to the US at every chance it gets. The Yanks should have been bragging "we came over in World War Two to save your asses and now were here to save your Olympics".

The Brits should be giving it right back calling Americans crude Netherlands, spoiled children of empire who ran away from home and then can't help fawning all over the royalty they once rejected. And just like that restaurant in Boston, any time the home team was competing against the Americans, local pub owners should "run out of ale" when American athletes came by. Show some pride over profits.

That I think sums it up for me. Good show and I'm glad the Olympics were I'm sure a memorable success for all those involved. Just while it was on going I would have like to have seen a little more cut eye given at starting lines, a little more trash talk before and after games, and yes just a little bit more hatred on the field.