I follow major international tournaments very closely (World Cup, Eurocup, sometimes Copa America on the national level, and the UEFA Champions League on the club level). Also, I usually keep track of the domestic leagues in Spain (La Liga, where Barcelona has been dominant in the last years) and Italy (Serie A).
I do not follow the English Premier League closely, even though it is the league that most of my Hong Kong friends love to watch (British colony influence and people like Manchester United, which was very dominant in the 90s and had David Beckham). It is worth noting that the Premier is ranked 3rd in the world in terms of revenue (behind NFL and MLB - crazy American sports).
But I can't help, but to dedicate a post to Leicester City.
One year ago, this team was struggling to get out of the last spot in the Premier League to escape relegation to a lower division. Somehow they were able to win the last 7 games of last season and stay in the Premier. This team has many unknown players. They are ranked 4th in terms of lowest budget on all Premier League teams. Usually the Premier is dominated by teams with large budgets (around 5 times larger than Leicester City), like Man. United, Man. City, or Chelsea. But the current season of the Premier is teaching us how a small and humble team can overtake the elite.
At the start of this current season, the betting odds for Leicester City to win the Premier was 5000 to 1. So I bet $100, I would get half a million dollars if Leicester wins the Premier. That's improbable, like extremely improbable. It is much more probable for Toronto Leafs to win the Stanley Cup (100 to 1), for Simon Cowell to become Prime Minister (500 to 1), or for Kim Kardashian to become US president on 2020 elections (2000 to 1). Basically, no one would have remotely thought that Leicester City would take the Premier.
This is one of the greatest feat in football history, Leicester City wins the Premier League title, after a fantastic season of consistency, teamwork, and a master manager who knows how to get the best out of his players. Many people describes this as the "most remarkable in football history", others as "an epic ending of a great movie". I have seen many epic moments in football, including dramatic last minute goals in a final game, or coming back from a 0-3 in a final game, or a player scoring 4 goals on a quarterfinals, or a player breaking all sorts of scoring records in a season. Definitely, what Leicester City accomplished this season is of equal caliber.
Some more facts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X097K10nHm0
As a football fan, even though I am not a Leicester fan, I am very happy because this reminds us that this sport it is not about money or superstars, but about how to consistently play well.
Consistency is a hard thing! It's one thing to be good at particular task once or twice, but it is another to be good at it consistently. And this a good lesson to take in general.
This is an example on how human effort can accomplish great things. Imagine how many remarkable things God can do against all odds!
This is a bit of stretch as an example, someone calculated that the odds for Jesus to fulfill 8 of the prophecies from the Old Testament is 1 in 10^17 (reference: https://carm.org/questions/about-doctrine/what-makes-you-think-christianity-only-way-god), which is a crazy large number. But indeed, Jesus fulfilled more than just 8 prophecies, and that is only possible because of the power of God. This shows that our God is remarkable, and He is truly almighty and omnipotent. So if you ever feel like an "underdog" on your Christian pursuits, just remember that our God is great.
