Airport Soccer

I found this 1998 Nike ad in a remarkable resource for wacky videos called "BryceWilson.net." It's a game of Airport Soccer as it might be played by champion soccer players while waiting for their delayed flight.

The flight is clearly one of fancy. Playing around the checkout counter is one thing. But playing on the airfield itself...? I suppose if you're a group of champion-soccer-playing airport employees with a death wish, it might be something you might want to consider.

No, no, it is nothing I would recommend, nor would I even hint at the apparent funnitvity of the concept. On the other hand, it is quite possible that a form of airport-appropriate soccer could in deed be played. Clearly a nearly empty concourse could become a most satisfyingly surrogate soccer-field. Obviously, the least dangerous of all airport soccer games would take place in an abandoned airport. Depending on which parts, and how much of the airport gets used, the game can become immensely challenging and fascinating. The ticket counters, baggage claim, the whole baggage handling system, and, but of course, the hangars, and the runways - each offer an environment that could prove conducive to soccer-like games unlike any other soccer-like games. In fact, given enough people, and soccer balls, we could probably create a soccer event that would prove far more compelling, imaginative, and fun than anything Nike has yet imagined. A soccer game for 10,000, perhaps, with a thousand soccer balls, maybe those soft soccer balls, with everyone wearing one of those padded sumo-wrestler suits so people can get really crazy, smashing and rolling each other across maybe 100 acres of empty airport....