Yet Another Football Rant

So far, so good.

I’ve managed, by successive acts of sheer lack of will, not to watch a single kick of the football World Cup in Brazil. 

I haven’t seen one theatrical swallow dive.  I haven’t heard one absurd post-match interview with the manager of a losing team bleating: “We can take some positives out of this” after watching his side thrashed 5-0 by Montenegro.  I’ve refrained from listening to one studio post-mortem conducted by former footballers speaking in mumbled monosyllabic monotones that I’d strain to understand even if they were speaking an approximation of English. 

By the way, is there a more plaintive, purposeless presenter than Gary Lineker?  Well, yes, I suppose there’s that burbling, bromide-bashing Brummie John Motson.  Vapid is the word that comes to mind.  They’d probably regard it as a compliment.

I didn’t even watch England’s first game – a loss to Italy – in which I understand from overheard conversations on trains that ‘our lads’ played attractive, attacking football.  As far as I’m concerned, they can play with water cannon firing pina coladas, or whatever it is they drink in Brazil.  And I’ll not be watching them play the next match, against Uruguay I think, whenever that is. 

It’s not that I wish the lads ill.  I don’t wish them anything, except to accomplish whatever it takes to remove themselves post haste from my television screens and from the pages of my newspapers. 

It’s the cricket season, for pity’s sake.  Get back to winter you muddied oafs!

Not watching is, I suppose, my futile and you’ll no doubt think ridiculous protest against the money spent on staging a tournament the net proceeds from which will largely end up in Swiss bank accounts controlled by FIFA.  But it’s more than that – actually, less than that.  It’s my total and unconditional lack of interest in a sport that continues, year after year, to degrade everything and everyone it touches, on the field and off.

“Aha,” says a friend.  “But I bet you’d start watching if England were to reach the quarter-final.” 

No, my friend, I would not.  I would not be watching if the England team were to attempt to reach the far side of the moon on a London bus driven by Colleen Rooney. 

And by all accounts, their chances of heading for the final in Brazil are about the same.