Soccer: Sport of beauty and beasts

SOCCER is a breathtaking sport that features dynamic athletes and awe-inspiring action, despite what all the haters say.

I futilely have been defending the sport for decades, but the detractors are absolutely correct about one thing: It attracts serious knuckleheads.

This week in knucklehead news we have alleged Hitler salutes and BMW smuggling as well as the newest backyard game: toss the grenade.

Guess who allegedly insulted Israeli striker Itay Shechter with Hitler salutes? Why, hooligans, of course. Kaiserslautern, the struggling German soccer club, asked police to investigate and pursue possible charges while urging fans to identify the perpetrators. The club said it "distances itself expressly from any form of racism, discrimination or anti-Semitism."

It's more difficult to distance from hooliganism.

On another front, Rio de Janeiro prosecutors are accusing Brazilian players Emerson and Diguinho of having links to a smuggling ring that illegally brought a BMW into Brazil from the United States.

The one-name soccer stars say the purchase was concluded lawfully. Prosecutors want to charge the players with contraband and money-laundering.

If charged and convicted, the players could face 4 to 14 years in prison.

And they would get new numbers to go along with their one names.

Meanwhile in Belgrade, Serbian police are investigating hurling. The kind that involves throwing a hand grenade into the yard of the house owned by DeSanka Stojkovic, the mother of Dragan Stojkovic, the coach of Nagoya Grampus soccer club. He is considered one of the best players in the history of Yugoslavian and Serbian football.

Police said the hand grenade exploded only several meters from the main entrance of the house last week. No one was injured in the blast, but soccer mom was inside the house.

I'm going to take a wild guess and say hooligans were outside. Soccer is universal in both appeal and lunacy.