Me vs Football

Image by theaardvark via Flickr

It appears to be be contagious. I don't know what the incubation period is so I don't know who I caught it from. I do know that the infection took slowly and innocuously and I was probably incurable by the time anyone noticed I had succumb. It may not have a long Latin name but football supporting is a affliction that should be understood.

As a child and through my teenage years I had a natural immunity to football, inherited from my Dad and his Dad who expressed no interest at all in sport during my formative years. Whether through genuine disinterest or out of a desire to be different from my peers, I was positively anti-football whenever anyone around me expressed or discussed an interest.

My first ever interest in football results came when I worked for HM Customs & Excise in Wolverhampton in the mid-1990s. I was manager to a staff of between 6 and 9 for 18 months and most of the were Wolves supporters. I would follow the mid-week results solely to gauge what mood my staff would be in the next day. A loss and they'd be fraught; arguing all day that they'd been robbed, the ref had been poor or they'd played well and deserved better (I've since learned that Wolves supporters in particular are known for these responses to a loss). A good win and they'd be on a high all day, chatty and pleasant to be around but not likely to get a great deal of work done. My best hope, as their manager, was for an unremarkable draw or win. They'd get some work done then.

After leaving that position, it would be years before I would have any reason to consider football. In the early 2000s my next door neighbour, an ardent Birmingham City FC fan, started helping me out at discos. I'd pick him up at around 5 to 5:30 on a Saturday and on some weeks the Blues match would still be playing so we'd stick it on the radio. He was quite a good ambassador for supporting a team and quite possibly the source of my infection. We'd quite often discuss the matches we were listening to or that had just finished.

Then, in 2005, Chasetown FC had a good FA Cup run reaching the first round proper playing then League 1 Oldham FC in a match that was televised by the BBC. I watched that match out of local pride and, against expectation, Chasetown forced a replay from Oldham with a 1-1 draw. I recall this as one of the first matches where I was actively supporting one team over another, with the possible exception Scotland or England international matches. Chasetown lost the replay away, as was expected but an interest in how they performed had been piqued.

In May 2006 I went to Madrid for my future Brother in Law's stag do and went to see my first ever football match. I saw Real Madrid play Deportivo La Coruna at the Santiago Bernabeu, one of the biggest football stadiums in the world. My first ever game and I was watching David Beckham playing in one of the most hallowed grounds, capable of holding 80,000 people.

The second game I ever went to was at St Andrews, home to Birmingham City in 2007. James (then 8) wanted to go and see a football match. So my neighbour offered to take us to see The Blues. We wanted a mid-week game were there was unlikely to be any trouble or crowding in the supporters that might frighten James, so we chose a Carling Cup match against Hereford. It didn't lead to the best match as an introduction for James.

I think the clincher, the point at which my resistance gave up, was in December 2007 when Chasetown FC did even better, getting though to the 3rd round. It was their 2nd round fixture against Port Vale FC, more specifically the replay at home after holding the League One team to a draw away.

The third match I attended was a non-league fixture between Chasetown and some team I don't remember. I attended to get a voucher that allowed me to buy a ticket to the Port Vale replay fixture. It was a totally different atmosphere. Almost more social and drinking than football. I don't even remember what the final score was.

But my 4th, and favourite to date, match was the FA Cup 2nd round replay at home (just 10 minutes walk from home) against Port Vale. A match we were expected lose but won, with a diving header in the last quarter. That was it, I was hooked. In that split second, when that impossible goal brought 1500 strangers together and we screamed and shouted.

Unfortunately Chasetown lost in the 3rd round to Championship team Cardiff FC, even though the Welsh team didn't put out anywhere near their strongest team. You couldn't get tickets for love nor money for that match so I had to make do with listening on the radio.

I'm still not what you'd call a "proper" fan. I rarely attend Birmingham City matches, following on the TV, radio or, if forced to, BBC's live text service. When I do go to see The Scholars, it's more about the opportunity to meet up with friends for a beer than about watching the match.

Instead,you'll find me hiding upstairs watching Blues matches on TV or listening on BBC WM and cheering when "we" win but not particularly moping when we lose. You'll find Sharon downstairs moping about the loss of her husband or sitting in the passenger seat of the car complaining about having to listen to the football again.

(This entry grew out of what was going to be a comment on Danny Smith's Blues and me post to BiNS.)