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The Ball is Round

from The Other Side by David Rovics

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about

I agonized for about a year about how to fulfill my friend Jack's request for a song about the Palestine national football team. I read a great book called How Soccer Explains the world, which Jack recommended. But still nothing. Then, on tour with Kristian von Svensson in Sweden, I presented my dilemma to him, and he suggested the notion, "the ball is round." Which, in case you're not European and you don't know this, means, as I learned from Kristian and later from many others, that anything can happen.

lyrics

Every country in the world has a football team
With matches at home and away
That's how it is if you're a national squad
You travel and you play
But if you play for Palestine
You never can be sure
If you can make it out of your house
And into the one next door

If you can make it out of your house
And into the next one down
Then you still never know
If you can make it out of town
If you can make it past the checkpoints
If you can make it past the wall
If you might possibly be able to fly
To another port of call

But the ball is round
And you never know
Which way it's gonna go

Most professional football players
Needn't have to think
If I go to training today
Will I end up in the clink
If I go to training
Will I be surrounded by barbed wire
Will I find a football pitch
Encircled, under fire

Chorus

It's just a little country
Maybe not a significant team
Ranked among the world
Not more than one-hundred-thirteen
But the very fact of their existence
Is a vision to behold
And the future is unwritten
I'm told

Chorus

credits

from The Other Side, released August 31, 2015
Co-written by me and Kristian von Svensson of Malmo, Sweden. He came up with the hook line for the song, which is at least half the effort in my view.

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David Rovics Portland, Oregon

Singer/songwriter, writer, podcaster (on Spotify, Substack & Patreon), anarchist, dad, lover of life.

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