Give the Champions League a chance

You will have received the soccer camp flyers by now and probably already muddied up the kitchen calendar with notes on last days of school, camp beginnings, and car pooling. That little memo about the fee deadline date is probably pushed to the margins via a double italic or color differential.

That's what's on paper. In your mind you'll have, before all is said and done, 44 parents to talk to, 179 phone calls to make and 1,865 trips to make back and forth to the soccer field. And don't forget the bottled water.

If you are prepared to invest such time and effort in your youngster's chosen future then why not sample the waters first. A litmus test of all soccer enthusiasm will emerge over the coming eight days, beginning with Tuesday's Champions League semifinal game between Barcelona and Chelsea, which is broadcast on ESPN 2 (2:45 p.m.).

Sure, they'll come home from school, leave a trail of book bags and jackets in their wake and demand a sandwich. They'll then flip to Nickelodeon or Hannah Montana and put their feet on the furniture.

But if the aforementioned game, which will be attended by 100,000 screaming fans amid a festival of color in the Spanish night sky, doesn't get the juices flowing and Wednesday's (April 29) encore of Manchester United v Arsenal (the other half of the final four) doesn't have them pulling the plug on your vacuuming, then perhaps there are indications that your summer camp plans are, well, a little wide of the net.

The rubber games in both semifinals occur next Tuesday and Wednesday -- by now there should be friends over unexpectedly, parents handing around and an empty fridge amid shouts and screams from the living room.

The Champions League semifinals will be watched in almost every country over the next eight days -- the contests will showcase the best talent in the world and the game of soccer doesn't get any better than this. Use this logic when suggesting politely to your children that they might like to sit down comfortably and sample the atmosphere (put another way, "you better watch this and like it or you can forget about goofing off with your friends at that camp in June.")