Wednesday Cannon Fodder: football pet peeves

We all have pet peeves. One of my biggest (and silliest) is people using a modifier before the word “unique” — “very unique” or “the most unique thing” etc. I know that unique has come to mean, at times, “unusual” instead of “the only one of it’s kind” and in that sense, it’s acceptable to modify it. But no. Be precise in your language. If you mean unusual, say unusual. Don’t modify unique. Something is either the only one or it isn’t.

Anyway with that personal rant out of the way, we turn to the CF topic of the day — football pet peeves. The little, mostly inconsequential things that happen on a football pitch that drive you nuts. One of my biggest is...referees (just kidding, mostly, but also not really).

But actually. It drives me nuts when a footballer plays a pass to a teammate in space that isn’t sufficiently in front of him or her that makes that teammate slow down or stop his forward movement. Sometimes they’re harmless because there wasn’t much space to exploit anyways. Sometimes they absolutely kill attacking / transition moves by slowing them to a literal standstill.

I think part of why it bugs me is that passes shouldn’t be that hard to play, and you see players make this mistake even when under no pressure. They just hit the wrong ball.

Bonus pet peeve: fans yelling “shoot” whenever players come with 30 yards of goal. I shouldn’t have to explain myself on that one.

What are some of your football pet peeves?