Football isn't life

A post written in Dec 2019.  The day after Arsenal  0 Manchester City 3

I decided then that "Football isn't life" would be a great title  - not having celebrated any titles for a while now, what did I know?  What I definitely didn't know was that football would cease to be part of life just a few months later, well at least temporarily.  At this time, football is still in limbo in England.  At the time of writing I thought it would be no bad thing to not take the game too seriously and I believe it all the more now.  I haven't missed it as much as I thought.  The way Arsenal had been playing was probably a big part of that.  I miss playing more.  My weekend football mates and I are all in injury time now (literally and figuratively) and would really give anything to get out there.  



I walked out early at the stadium yesterday.  I walked out despite paying good money for a ticket.  I walked out despite the fact that I used to sneer at supporters who were caught by TV cameras leaving early.

Now I understand.  People leave not because they have cheap(er) season tickets.  Well maybe they pay less than a tourist who buys his ticket off a tout in the street or through Tickethub.  But it still isn’t cheap for the average fan.  And especially not at Arsenal.  Fans probably pay the highest prices in the country.  But that only works if you are either entertained, or are actually winning stuff.  Preferably both.  We are doing neither.

You can win without being entertaining, which I suppose is a sort of entertainment in its own way.  But then to each his own I guess.  And if winning is your only reason for supporting a team then you’re likely to be miserable more than you’re not.  

Sport fandom used to be less complicated before money (and social media) changed the whole dynamics of it.  You supported a team because you felt a sense of belonging, however that tribalism started.  It was your local club, or like me from farther shores, something about the aesthetics or traditions or history of the club appealed to you and made it your team.  Winning was of course still important but defeat was never amplified, and did not reverberate to the extent it does today.

You’d think that paying high prices would encourage fans to stick to the bitter end but perversely I think it actually has the opposite effect.  Now as consumers of expensive entertainment, fans will not tolerate sub-par performances and willingly continue to subject themselves to the equivalent of a root canal, though i think it is quite rare in other forms of live entertainment.  I suppose it’s difficult (and rude to other patrons) to leave a play or musical while it’s still going on.

Of course there are varying degrees of masochism.  I count myself as tending towards the extreme because I stayed on till the 87th minute.  Many had left even before the clock hit 80.

People leave not because they aren’t ardent supporters that wouldn’t leave a game early.  On the contrary, it is a sign that they probably care too much and leave because staying on would cause more pain.

In a way it’s the ultimate form of signalling one’s displeasure.  You can boo the team, but that shows you still care.  Walking out can mean that it has changed to indifference, which is even worse.  At the very least it means there are more important things in your life vying for your attention at the time.  Like not getting caught in the crush at the tube station after the game because you have an early start the next day.

And in the larger scheme of things, perhaps that’s not such a bad thing.  Football at its best, is as amazing and uplifting a sport as they come.  But it’s not life.

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Postscript :
A few months later, I catch the game on TV.  The game was over by halftime and could have been worse if not for Leno's save of the season.  And the cameras also captured the fans leaving, a trickle that became a torrent towards the end.