Neverending Top Ten #6.1 - World Cup Fever

I'm writing this post at 7.30pm on Wednesday the 11th of July, a confession which I'm sure will be greeted with horror by many readers of this blog... even the Scottish ones.

"You mean, you're not watching the football? The semi-final? England's greatest opportunity since 1966? You're writing a bloody music blog instead, one that gets read by 9 people if you're lucky?"

Well, yes.

But this isn't an anti-football post, I'm not going to be one of those football-loathing party poopers who whinge on about 11 overpaid morons chasing a cow's stomach round the pitch for 90 minutes etc. etc... because the game is on downstairs and Sam is watching it with his granddad. Early on in the World Cup, Louise (who's not a football fan either, but did grow up in a house of them) decided to try to encourage Sam's interest in the game, "so he won't end up as a social pariah like you".

Those weren't her exact words, but that was the general gist.

It's true that not liking football does hamper you in certain social situations, especially ones where all the blokes go off in one room and leave the women to talk about normal, sensible, real world things (and Love Island). Because one of the few things most blokes can talk about is football, and if you can't talk about it... if you can't even feign an interest... you'd be better off going out in the garden and talking to the gnomes.

This isn't the only concession I've made to the game I've held a lifelong antipathy for. Every Saturday morning I take Sam to Little Strikers, a junior football class where he can pick up skills that might mean he won't always be last to be picked for the team in P.E. when he gets a bit older.

Strange as it may seem, I once had my football dreams

But I was always the last one, the last to get chosen

When my classmates picked their teams

I guess that was the way it stayed in every game I played

Life just tripped me and clattered and kicked me

Till you picked me from the parade

At least I had one up on Billy Bragg in that regard... I never dreamed of being a football player in the first place.



Still, I do wonder whether we're doing Sam a huge disservice here. What if England actually win? What if his first experience of football, and the World Bloody Cup, is a victory? Isn't that just setting him up for a lifetime of hurt? Louise's dad was 16 in 1966... he's had to face up to crushing disappointment upon crushing disappointment ever since, but at least he was 16. You kind of expect things to gradually get worse when you're 16. It's in your teenage DNA. But Sam's only 4! If he really starts to believe the dream at such a young age... isn't that some kind of unbearable cruelty to inflict on one so young?

To be fair, I'm not actually that sure he's interested in the game itself, but he does like the statistics. Maybe he'll become a mathematician rather than a sportsman. I hope so. Better odds in that future, surely...

I don't want to play football

I don't understand the rules of the game

I don't want to play football

I don't understand the thrill of the running, catching, throwing

Taking orders from a moron

Grabbing for the sweaty crotches

Getting hit by people I don't know

Sugar, I'd rather play a different sort of game

Sugar, the girls are just as good as boy at playing

Well, by now we all know the outcome of this particular story... I'm writing this postscript on Thursday morning. Last night, when the game went to extra time, Sam decided to go to bed, "so he wouldn't be too tired in the morning". A very sensible decision for a 4 year old, but also perhaps one that reflects a dawning awareness of the harsh realities of life.

The plus side to not being a football fan is this... While a large part of the country woke up this morning feeling somewhere between crestfallen and heartbroken, I woke up feeling like I always do. (Somewhere between crestfallen and heartbroken, but not because of the football.) Sam woke up, asked what the score was, and accepted it pretty easily. (There's been lots of talk over the last couple of weeks about "being a good sport" and "not the winning but the taking part".) In the long run, it's probably a better result for him than setting him up to believe we can all be winners...