Why did England goalie Robert Green let that easy ball roll in for the only USA goal in the 1-1 tie at the World Cup?  I believe I may have the answer.

Was Green distracted? And if so, by what? How could he allow an easy roller, one that any schoolboy would have stopped, to bounce off his gloves and into the net? I've concluded that he must have been distracted by something. He simply put his goalkeeping on automatic pilot because the shot was not a dangerous one. He had stopped balls like that thousands of times in practice and in competition. There must have been something pulling his concentration away from the game, something eating at him, something he could not control.

I have serendipity to thank for solving this puzzle. Early Saturday morning, before Robert Green and England faced the USA team in South Africa, I wrote about my Shakespeare bobblehead. I happened to notice that Shakespeare is holding a quill in his left hand. Was Shakespeare left-handed or right-handed? I went on the Google to look for the answer.

The prevailing opinion, based on handwriting experts, is that Shakespeare was right-handed. And yet ... and yet ... there will always be those who challenge the majority opinion, and not just those who have studied the Shakespeare bobblehead. On Saturday morning, after watching the USA tie England, I resumed my Google search. As I drilled deeper, bouncing from link to link, I discovered that those who believe Shakespeare was in fact left-handed are incredibly passionate. Their attacks on the orthodox right-handed believers have triggered an equally passionate defense by those who follow the handwriting experts.

As you might expect, there is more heat than light in this debate, as each side lobs its arguments at the enemy camp, reminding me of that scene in Monty Python and the Holy Grail in which the French throw cows from their castle onto King Arthur and the English below. (I thank God every day for the English, who have given us a great language, the great sport of soccer, and Monty Python.)

So, about an hour into my research on the "was Shakespeare right-handed or left-handed" war, I came across a lengthy, life-or-death kind of blog by a London resident in West Ham named Robert Green who said that the right-handed crowd were "a pack of lemmings following the handwriting experts off a cliff." Robert Green? West Ham? I remembered that the unfortunate soccer goalie Robert Green played for West Ham. As I reread his blog, I found numerous soccer references, including ones that a goalkeeper might use.

Then I found the USA/England highlights and replayed the soft goal. I wanted a close-up of Robert Green in goal as Dempsey's easy shot rolled toward him.  I wanted to read his lips, to discover that he was saying "Shakespeare right-handed? What rubbish!" But alas, there was no close-up. Even so, I think it's safe to surmise that Green was distracted by nothing less, and nothing more, than this fiery debate about which of Shakespeare's hands held the quill when he wrote his immortal words.

Being left-handed myself, I tend to laugh at the handwriting experts. I'm happy to be on Robert Green's side. And on the side of Alexander Pope, who reminds us that "To err is human, to forgive divine." I study my Shakespeare bobblehead. He holds the quill in his left hand. And he should know!

Tags: Alexander Pope, bobblehead, left-handed, Monty Python, Robert Green, Shakespeare, Soccer, West Ham, World Cup

This entry was posted on Monday, June 14th, 2010 at 9:43 am and is filed under Sports, Writing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.