World Cup Finals 2010 Soccer Team Colors - Clockwork Orange and Red Fury
By Alex Baker People have been wearing a lot of orange and red lately. The reason for this is that eleven men who wear orange and another eleven who wear red have been running around fields in South Africa kicking balls into nets. The Netherlands national soccer team, known as “The Clockwork Orange,” and the Spanish national team, “The Red Fury” has been on winning streaks that saw them matching up in the final of this summer’s World Cup.The Spanish team is known as “La Furia Roja,” which in English means, “The Red Fury.” As you might guess the Spanish team wears jerseys that are red. It’s a kind of sunny crimson color red, like Iberian wine on a sunny day. The Spanish fans wear their share of it in support of their team.
Describing the Dutch orange as “brilliant” is an understatement. When talking about the team’s uniforms “electric” is a better word. When describing the fans you’d have to call the orange “ecstatic.”
The eleven men in electric orange electrified the people of their nation. Holland, the country of my father, has twice previously been to the World Cup final and lost. The little North Sea nation, where I partially grew up, has been lately awash in a sea of orange. People have been hanging orange banners, wearing orange wigs, scarves and jumpsuits. Many have literally been painting themselves orange from head to toe. 
Picturing the red, white and blue Dutch flag you may wonder why the Dutch choose orange as their color? It comes from the House of Oranje, who were the Royal family of Holland. William of Oranje’s legacy it seems has become one of grown men at soccer matches wearing full-body orange lion suits with orange whiskers painted on their faces.
The final between the Clockwork Orange and the Red Fury had all the makings of one of the most exciting and colorful World Cup finals in modern times. But in the end it was a little underwhelming. It played out as a kind of high impact chess match between two teams whose comparable level of excellence seemed to cancel each other out at times.
The colors however did not disappoint. The Dutch wore their classic orange while the Spaniard wore deep, regal blue to contrast them. In the end it was the men of the Red Fury in their blue uniforms that held the trophy aloft. Back in Spain a spontaneous celebration of the red clad masses erupted that went on into the following day as the often-fractious nation united behind the success of the Red Fury.
The men in orange meanwhile, sat crumpled on the pitch, the green grass stained with their blood, sweat and tears. There was a colossal orange hangover in Holland the next day. Many Amsterdammers, having missed the last train home, awoke on train platforms wrapped in Dutch flags.
No matter who you root for the conclusion of a World Cup can leave you feeling a little hollow. People all over the world now have to wait another four years before the men in red, orange, blue and all the other colors of the rainbow come to dazzle and entertain us again on the fields of green.