‘Why do you like football?’ Asked no one.
I didn’t like sports when I was growing up. They weren’t for me. My school didn’t do team games officially and it was easy to duck out of games played in the car park when spring weather arrived. It was usually some form of baseball as this was the USA. My position was ‘Way Out Field’ and this meant I could read a book or play ‘Drunk’ or ‘Horse’ with my fellow non-sporty friends. (‘Drunk’, if you’re wondering, involved staggering around until someone fell over. ‘Horse’ is self-explanatory if you’ve ever met a horse-mad school-aged girl.) When I got to high school, sport meant humiliation in shorts and smelly gym clothes. I had no clue how to play anything. I cried my way to passing basic gymnastics and still can’t do a forward roll.
I had a cousin who liked tennis, especially Wimbledon. My dad was – and is – an avid follower of ice hockey as was my grandmother. Pele made an impact as someone well-known, but I wasn’t inspired to find out about football. Kind friends took me along to a basketball game and a baseball game of our city’s teams. I saw some big names play, notably Dennis Rodman of the Detroit Pistons and Cecil Fielder of the Detroit Tigers. But nothing clicked: they were nice times out with friends and nothing more.
I was a fan of music, though, and New Order’s ‘World in Motion’ reached my ears as a celebration of what I later found out was something called ‘Italia ’90”. I liked the song, but didn’t really know what it was about. There was a strange rap – ‘Catch me if you can, cause I’m the England man. And what you’re looking at is the master plan’ – in the middle of the keyboards and bass of NO mixed with some jaunty piano. ‘Wow, they really like En-ger-land!’ I thought.
Then came 1994. A recent article on the BBC website inspired me to write this post: USA 94: The World Cup that ‘Changed Everything’
The first football match I ever went to was a World Cup match at Detroit’s Silverdome (which was actually north of Pontiac but was then the home of American football’s Detroit Lions). My then English boyfriend (and future first husband) was coming to visit and wanted to know if I could get tickets for a World Cup game – any game would do. I easily got tickets for Switzerland v Romania. I find by consulting the internet that I’ve misremembered the result! I thought Romania won but it was Switzerland 4-1. (Perhaps it was Romania’s red card that I’ve had in my mind all this time.) I also find from the internet that one Roy Hodgson was Switzerland’s manager at the time. I enjoyed the spectacle of the day – the Swiss cowbells and Romania’s bright yellow strip. But, again, football failed to take hold on me.
Things changed when I moved to London. Sunday afternoons meant meeting up with friends with parcels of newspapers to read while enjoying a pint in a pub. Sunday newspapers back then offered a wealth of entertainment for all tastes. I could read the culture and lifestyle pages while others caught up with politics and sport. And, usually, there was a television with football on. I listened to the football chat. I found out what teams my new friends supported and why. I watched the games and got to understand how football worked. I found that I liked it a lot. I liked checking the table to see how my friends’ teams were doing. I watched ‘Match of the Day’ – and was a bemused by the theme tune as I’d been by ‘World in Motion’. I decided that I needed a team of my own and I wanted one that would a) be different from everyone else’s and b) be a winning team. I was an unashamed glory hunter.
I took advice. One Premier League team stood out as likely to win the 1995/96 season. I liked the look of their smart black and white strip. They had exciting players and winning ways. I chose Newcastle United as my adopted team and they’ve been my team ever since.
At least it’s not been boring!
My new interest primed me for finding my international team. Why do I support England? Easy, I was in the right time and place for Euro ’96. It’s a long time ago now – 30 years of hurt on top of the original 30 referenced in ‘Three Lions’. Euro ’96 was a social event for me. I finally ‘got’ what sport can be. I understood the chat, watched the games in pubs, had friends ’round to watch, and saw a real coming together of fans. Even non-sporty people like me could enjoy the drama and follow the stories. It was great – except for the end result, of course.
I then watched England’s ‘Golden Generation’ offer promise then fade. I watched the Southgate Renaissance (and I hope that continues).
And that’s just the men’s team. I’ve had the joy of watching the Lionesses achieve international success. ‘It’s coming home’? – it already has – twice! I also had the delight of attending the first ever Newcastle United women’s match held at St James’s Park against Alnwick Town in May 2022.
So, yes, I must confess that I’m a football fan. To quote a different New Order song: ‘Never knew it, but of course I was’. No prizes for knowing the football-related title of the song it comes from!