Bonus thoughts - Why are the big teams doing so poorly? Granted, the reasons are many, but the Jubalani ball, so often criticized in the past few days, is clearly one of them. However, the real culprit is over-training. Elite level athletes practice routine manouvers for hundreds of hours, repeating them with a degree of consistency that is hard to believe. Below is a short clip of the legendary Clarence Seedorf fooling around with the ball and discussing how it is different from other balls. The long and short of things is that it's lighter and appears to spin more, requiring players to hit it both softer, and at a blunter angle to reduce spin. He also recommends that players alter their aim, all of which are skills that players have ingrained to the point of reflex, and now requires a fraction of a second to think about, often the difference between hitting it a goal or not.
The irony, is that less skilled players often have to spend more time up front considering all of these things that come unconsciously to the elite level players, meaning they are less likely to be as affected by the differences in the ball. Having said that, it's reasonable to expect that the better players are going to have this all figured after a few games.
