Rod Liddle
Already a subscriber? Log in
Enjoyable though the Euros were, they nonetheless left the country even more starkly divided than before, between a metropolitan middle class and, er, everybody else. But then, that is the nature of big football tournaments: they draw in all the people who never usually go to football matches and who, upon being exposed to the sort of stuff that goes on (or used to go on), become appalled and outraged at the uncouthness on display. They see fans who jostle and swear and are a bit lairy and shout out rude things, often using discommodious grammar. How very different it is to Glyndebourne or, indeed, Twickenham and Lord’s. Why can’t these monsters behave like those nice people, they wonder? (I read several columns along the same lines in the morning papers — how the Euros showed both the best and worst of our country, by which they meant the nice multicultural players kneeling and lovely fans in face paint vs working class people being belligerent.)
That awful dirge known as ‘Football’s Coming Home’ has a certain irony about it. The song was released to celebrate the tournament at which football left its home and was never to return — except perhaps in the lower reaches of the league system. Euro 96, held in England, exacerbated the embourgeoisification of football and the process of wresting it bodily from the people who, for a century, had been its sole adherents, the working class. Mexican waves and foam hands, naughty songs frowned upon, no rude chanting. Not long after Euro 96 a Millwall friend of mine got done by the Old Bill for shouting abuse at an opposing manager sitting in the dugout. ‘Things have come to a pretty pass,’ he told me, ‘when you can’t call Russell Slade a bald c***.’ But you can’t, not any more. You can’t boo your opponents’ national anthem, either, because the people new to the game think it’s discourteous, despite it having been a noble tradition for at least 50 years and probably before.
Anyway, Gareth and the lads. Let us know what you are going to do about Qatar. Beacon of light or headlamp of hypocrisy? We’ll see.
Because you read about black lives matter
Also by Rod Liddle
Latest
Comments
Join the debate for just $5 for 3 months
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for $5.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just $5 for 3 monthsAlready a subscriber? Log in