Football

I have finally discovered what it is about football that I so dislike – footballers, commentators, pundits and money. I have nothing against the idea behind the game, it used to be a good game played by sportsmen who knew what being sporting meant. The nice green pitch and those crisp white lines, they seem the best part of the game – but almost everything else about the game is nauseating!

Watching the Euro qualifiers or the Premier League, you see highly paid professional sportsmen throwing themselves on the ground every time they might come into the merest contact with an opposition player. They roll about on the ground; they clasp the so called injured part of their body and thrash about like a wounded zebra swimming the great Zambezi River, waiting to be snaffled by a passing crocodile! The whistle blows, a free kick is awarded and suddenly, it’s a miracle, they rise majestically to their feet and carry on playing. Perhaps there is some healing power in the grass! Perhaps rolling vigorously on grass is somehow a natural painkiller, like green aspirin? The next time my in-growing toenail plays up, I will run out onto the lawn and roll on the turf. I will let you know the result but I don’t hold out much hope.

Or perhaps it is the sound of the whistle; perhaps in some throw back to Pavlov, the sound of the whistle pierces the agony and triggers a chemical release within the brain thereby making recovery immediate.

And as for commentators – purveyors of the bleeding obvious! Lampard has the ball; he passes to Beckham, Beckham to Cole, blah blah blah. Radio commentary on television – why?

And finally, those retired has-beens who sit in judgement, so lofty are their opinions of themselves, no wonder they put them in boxes on the roof!

The endless parade of replays from every angle you can imagine, goal post cameras, eye in the sky cameras, the camera in the end of Wayne Rooney’s boot!

Football was much more fun and much less irritating before the advent of big money. The players are paid too much money, the commentators are paid too much attention and the pundits are paid too much deference.

Why are we so wrapped up in this ugly game?