I’m not a great sports fan, but I do sometimes watch some of the big events on TV. To my great surprise I found myself watching quite a lot of the matches in the European Cup, that end a couple of weeks ago. What fascinated me was the progress of the Greek team. As the tournament went on the Greeks, who started at 150 to 1 against winning the Cup, beat team after team, that had players that were more skilful and talented than the Greeks. The reason the commentators claimed was that the Greeks, German manager, was tactically more acute than his opponents. You could say that the Greeks victory was a triumph of intelligence over talent.
This reminded me of a Wimbledon final many years ago when Arthur Ashe beat the supposedly invincible Jimmy Connors. Curiously, the Guardian revived an account of the match a few days ago. I can remember watching the match and puzzling over its meaning. At the time I was trying to understand the nature of creativity, intelligence and learning – a quest that continues to this day – and thinking about “the Intelligence of the tennis player” took me to some places I hadn’t been before.
Reflecting on this again, I realised, that while there is a kind of intellectual pleasure in watching the triumph of intelligence over talent, the problem is that it is a bit dull. For the non-sports fan like myself what is missing is that sense of transcendental magic that one gets from seeing a super talented athlete, like Muhammad Ali or Maradona, perform.