While hockey and football get most of the non-UFC attention as far as violence in sports go, it’s high time to salute the orgy of thuggery that is girls’ soccer.

The big breakout bad-girl – the “Vinnie Jones with the double-X chromosome”, if you will – is the Univerisity of New Mexico’s Elizabeth Lambert, who recently punched and kicked and tripped and slapped her way through a NCAA west conference semi-final game against Brigham Young University.

Though all she received during the game was a yellow card, Lambert has been suspended indefinitely by her team, and been dubbed (albeit cheekily) “America’s Greatest Villain” by Deadspin.com.

Obviously, the video is a lot of fun to watch, and some of her hits are just shy of out-and-out assault, but the reaction to her antics has more to do with people’s ignorance of the realities of soccers (and perhaps of young women).

Blogger and soccer dad Tbogg adds some perspective …

A couple of things. First off, with any kind of officiating, Lambert never should have reached the point she did. The forearm shiver to the back? Very common. The hard tackle for the ball? Again, common. The very hard tackle from behind with no intent on the ball? There’s your red card. (For those not up on this crazy no-hands game, a red card is an automatic ejection, your team plays down a man for the rest of the game, and, in the NCAA, a suspension for the next game). As for the ponytail pull, I’ve seen a lot of very physical women’s soccer games, but I’ve never seen that before. Which is how Elizabeth Lambert got to where she is today.

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Based on my experience ( and I have seen more girls/womens soccer games than I really ever wanted to) the hard physical play starts at about twelve years of age for girls. In my own daughter’s case, it first manifested itself at about ten when she raced across the field and drilled an opposing player in a manner that was more Ronnie Lott than Mia Hamm. It was a red card offense, but the center referee seemed honestly stunned by a player that age doing something so flagrant that she could only muster up a yellow card and an admonition to “never do that again”. Six years later Casey attempted something similar, missed, and ended up with a fractured collar bone when she collided with the ground instead. Obviously she didn’t listen.