Julian Casablancas On England’s Euro 2020 Semifinal Win: “Soccer Is Such Bullshit”

Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images

Julian Casablancas On England’s Euro 2020 Semifinal Win: “Soccer Is Such Bullshit”

Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images

As England’s men’s national team has advanced throughout this summer’s Euro 2020 tournament, one phrase has been repeated online to the point of meme-dom: “It’s coming home.” It’s a reference to David Baddiel, Frank Skinner, and Lightning Seeds’ song “Three Lions (Football’s Coming Home),” a fight song for England soccer that hit #1 in the UK twice in the ’90s. “It’s coming home” = “England’s going to win the championship.” And if they beat Italy this Sunday, it really is coming home.

Yesterday, with a 2-1 win over Denmark, England advanced to the Euro final for the first time ever. Officially known as the UEFA European Championship, the tournament is basically a miniature Europe-only World Cup. It’s been played every four years since 1960, and the farthest England ever got before this year was the semifinals in 1968 and 1996. So the 2020 tournament — which is being played in 2021 for obvious reasons — is already a historic success for the Three Lions. (That’s the official nickname for England’s team, and the title of the Lightning Seeds song. Keep up, nerds!)

Wednesday’s win was, however, quite controversial. Harry Kane scored the deciding goal on the rebound from a penalty kick in overtime. The penalty was awarded when England’s Raheem Sterling seemingly fell down in the box without being fouled, an example of the kind of flopping that has been widely criticized by soccer observers for years. Among those criticizing this particular flop is Julian Casablancas.

In a post on Instagram yesterday, the Strokes and Voidz frontman offered a self-described rant about Sterling’s apparent dive. “wow,” it began. “soccer is such bullshit, lolll.” The message continued:

i don’t even care about outcome –best team win, i’m an argentina/USA fan, but soccer is a disgrace. it’s an ACTING CONTEST. whoever dives in the box best, wins close games. lollll
total horseshit.
&what’s the point of review if they spend 7 seconds??
(and why is every fucking person giving their opinion british, ha. the worst.)
i was rooting for france in world cup and griezman was fave player UNTILLL he dove in the final to give them go-ahead goal. or italy’s world cup against australia. all of them – including this. tainted. sorry. just is.
just like Sterling WAS my favorite player in this game, but man….(his left foot is the interesting part of the acting job fall- left leg stops to make body fall believably)
soccer needs repair.
-the end

In a separate soccer post, Casablancas pleaded with the Argentina coaching staff to start Sergio “Kun” Agüero in the Copa América final Saturday night. (Copa América is basically the South American version of the Euro tournament.) Next to some photos of Agüero, Casablancas wrote, “while i’m soccer ranting: SOMEBODY IN ARGENTINA — GET THRU TO THE COACH/TEAM/SOMEONE: START THIS FRIGGIN MAN!” A win for Argentina would be the first international championship of the legendary Lionel Messi’s career; he won a bunch of Spanish and Champions League trophies with Barcelona, but Argentina has never been able to get it together during his career. Aren’t you learning so much about soccer today?!

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