Barcelona is stupid; lower-division goalmouth scrambles are the real beautiful game

“You know, they call fútbol ‘The Beautiful Game,’” some smug jerk has probably told you at some point in your life, as they proceeded to gush about Johan Cruyff’s total football, tiki-taka, and the genius of Pep Guardiola. That person is a big dumb idiot, because they’ve clearly missed the point of soccer, which is to produce as many funny and chaotic moments as possible.

Goalmouth scrambles are the pinnacle of the sport when it comes to entertainment value. Take this wonderful series of blocks and goal-line clearances from English fourth-division side Crawley Town, which helped them hold Accrington Stanley to a 0-0 draw this weekend.

Sometimes, endless penalty area pinball matches can go the other way, leading to a deflating moment for the defense when they realize that putting their bodies on the line a half-dozen times in the span of 10 seconds just wasn’t good enough, as the seventh shot rolls into the back of the net. New York Red Bulls II sealed the USL championship on Sunday in exactly this fashion.

So screw your beautiful game. This is real beautiful soccer.