Saturday, June 19, 2004
After the strange sensation of watching the England France match in the pub with most of the locals cheering for France, I didn't expect to hear them all cheering for England when I went back to watch them play Switzerland. Yet they mostly did. Someone explained to me that Switzerland put Ireland out of the qualifying stage for this championship.
Someone else explained that these same guys who cheer against England will all be supporting Man United, Liverpool etc come the start of the new season. So I left in good spirits and returned an hour later to watch France Croatia to discover everyone was now supporting Croatia. I think there must be strange pecking order, with countries who have recently dumped on Ireland at the bottom, countries who have been dumping on Ireland for 800 years just above them, then countries who eat frogs and horses next and at the top come countries that have themselves been dumped on by bigger neighbours over the years. We'll see what happens when that Iraqi javelin thrower goes to Athens later this year.
So halfway through the game we're all sitting at this noisy, buzzing bar transfixed by that rare thing, a genuinely exciting football match, and a guy walks in, stands next to me, gazes at the score, turns and says "What sort of result do we want?". I ask "It depends on where you're from? Are you English?".
"Fuck no! What's the best result for Ireland?".
I tell him "You're not in the championship"
"I know. For keeping England out".
I go very English, not wholly intentionally:
"Oh....um, Croatia. Cheer for Croatia".
So my pecking order theory is bullshit. Sport, as anyone who went to school in England learns, brings out the worst in people. All the primitive urges of boastfullness, domination, humiliation and arrogance are as essential as shorts and trainers to the competitive. Wearing your i'm-a-twat-badge Hackett with the collars up doesn't help either.
Saturday rant over and done with - i'm off to the pub to probably cheer Latvia and the Czechs, since the Germans haven't had as much occupation and the Dutch, er, wear a lot of orange.
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Someone else explained that these same guys who cheer against England will all be supporting Man United, Liverpool etc come the start of the new season. So I left in good spirits and returned an hour later to watch France Croatia to discover everyone was now supporting Croatia. I think there must be strange pecking order, with countries who have recently dumped on Ireland at the bottom, countries who have been dumping on Ireland for 800 years just above them, then countries who eat frogs and horses next and at the top come countries that have themselves been dumped on by bigger neighbours over the years. We'll see what happens when that Iraqi javelin thrower goes to Athens later this year.
So halfway through the game we're all sitting at this noisy, buzzing bar transfixed by that rare thing, a genuinely exciting football match, and a guy walks in, stands next to me, gazes at the score, turns and says "What sort of result do we want?". I ask "It depends on where you're from? Are you English?".
"Fuck no! What's the best result for Ireland?".
I tell him "You're not in the championship"
"I know. For keeping England out".
I go very English, not wholly intentionally:
"Oh....um, Croatia. Cheer for Croatia".
So my pecking order theory is bullshit. Sport, as anyone who went to school in England learns, brings out the worst in people. All the primitive urges of boastfullness, domination, humiliation and arrogance are as essential as shorts and trainers to the competitive. Wearing your i'm-a-twat-badge Hackett with the collars up doesn't help either.
Saturday rant over and done with - i'm off to the pub to probably cheer Latvia and the Czechs, since the Germans haven't had as much occupation and the Dutch, er, wear a lot of orange.
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