American football comes out


American football, better known in Lebanon as "that American sport where they all beat each other up," has been pretty much dormant in Lebanon until recent efforts to revive the game at AUB. American football, known simply as football in the United States, where the other football is called soccer, has, generally, only been popular among Lebanese who have lived in the States and then returned to Lebanon. As a result, players of the game have been restricted to tossing a football around on the Green Oval without any means of playing organized football. An attempt was made by some students at AUB last year (1999-2000) to organize the game. The players initially numbered around 55 but slowly diminished throughout the year until only about eight regular players were showing up near the end of the academic year. The whole idea seized-up around March. At the beginning of this year, Dr. Jason Miller, a professor in the English Department decided to try to revive the game at AUB. Along with Professor Jeremy Koons of the Philosophy Department and Professor James Wackett, also of English, Miller received the go-ahead from the AUB athletics director, Ghaleb Halimi. Miller explained, "Initially, we talked to Halimi about using the field to play football unofficially. He told us that we could use the field on the condition that we organize the game officially at AUB." Practices are held on the Green Field every Sunday at 4:00pm. "Initially, we had around 15 students regularly showing up, but after more advertising the number has increased to around 25," Miller said. When asked about why this year has been more successful than last year's attempt, Miller told Outlook, "We aren't having trouble with reserving the field. Three professors gives more security to the Athletics Department." According to Miller, they "are going to try to hold an eight on eight exhibition game at the end of the year for students to come and watch. This will, hopefully, raise awareness about the game so that more students will give it a try next year." Concerning the physical and sometimes violent aspect of the game of football, Koons told Outlook, "We started playing two-hand touch, but then the guys wanted to play tackle, but you can call it gentle tackle." Miller told Outlook, "It's good that we spend time during the week in an academic mind set and then we sort of see the students differently out here. You get to get out of the books." Professor Wackett added jokingly, "I like to come out here and knock the students around a little." Adib Samara, a sophomore biology major, told Outlook, "I played last year even though I wasn't AUB yet. I love the game, and there isn't much opportunity to play in Lebanon. We just come out here and play some rough football every Sunday." Raja Abu-Hassan, one of the students who organized American football last year, told Outlook, "It's a little dangerous without equipment, and we can't get equipment until we become an official team. This game won't succeed in Lebanon until other universities start making more teams." Professor Miller told Outlook, "The most important thing is that we have a good time out there, and we encourage more students to come out and join in." Miller jokingly added, "We are very grateful to the Athletics Department for letting us come out here to shed some blood on the grass."