Crikey. It's almost 3 years since I last posted. What started out as a fun idea succumbed to the reality of working full time, bringing up children and most relevantly (and pretentiously) not really finding my voice. I'm not sure I've found my voice yet but I can feel a stream of consciousness coming on.
Back in 2010 I decided not to renew my Leyton Orient season ticket. What had been a pleasure had become a drudge. I had one mainly to save money. Once I bought I felt I couldn't miss any games to make sure I got my money's worth. So I stopped; and I felt liberated. Then, I remembered going to non-league games as a youngster. I started going to them again and felt even more liberated. In the end I went to more to football than I had in years. I still went to Orient but not as some kind of weird obligation to myself so that felt better too.
I had misgivings though. The Olympics hadn't happened yet but I was a bit suspicious of the prospect of that big stadium being built in Stratford. I wasn't bothered about a bigger side moving in next door (and I'm still not) but I was worried about an ambitious plan to take Orient there. This is a worry that still hasn't completely subsided. Because deep down I know that most routes away from Brisbane Road would mean me parting company permanently with the team I support sooner rather than later. So it's fair to say that as well as saving money and not feeling obligated to and spending more time with my family not renewing my season ticket was also a case of putting a bit of emotional distance between me and Orient before someone else did it for me.
It was both the sense of liberation I felt and the slightly dislocated sense of disillusionment I felt with Orient that gave birth to this blog. They weren't responsible parents though and this blog still died. (I still haven't decided whether this is a belated epitaph or a breath of new life!). And yet...and yet the annoyance that I had felt with top flight football continued to grow. The hype bored me. The mind games bored me.The vitriol bored and depressed me. For last couple of months I have been toying with the idea of giving next season a miss; at least in terms of professional football. I'll tackle the elephant in the room first. If Orient hadn't lost to Rotherham United and their cheating fraudulent manager in the play-off final I would have there with bells on for Orient's first season in the Championship for an aeon. I'm not that silly. Additionally, for no real logical reason, the World Cup is exempt from this disillusion. I'm fully aware of FIFA's dodginess but the World Cup is just about the only thing that can be relied upon to bring out the 8 year old boy in me and reignite that childlike feeling of excitement. For crying out loud, I was stood in the middle of a busy tube station concourse a few hours ago at the height of rush hour, swapping Panini football stickers. (Quite how they seem to have gone viral this year is another discussion in its own right.). I may struggle with the pre-tournament friendlies but I will be immersing myself in the World Cup completely. But do I fancy Premier League 2014/15? Not so much.
Money is the root of all evil. That's the easy explanation. To go a little deeper; it's the uneven distribution of the money and the sad fact that most fans don't care where the money comes from if it delivers (or at least promises to) results and trophies. But this week as I tried to expunge the memories of Orient's failed penalty shootout with thoughts of the World Cup by concentrating on sorting out my swaps and charging through the first few chapters of James Montague's Thirty One Nil that I had a slight epiphany. Money and football is a huge problem but it's not the thing souring my relationship with it. Perspective. The huge lack of perspective at almost every corner is what is doing it. Arsenal fans have bewildered me over the years with their desperation at being an well run solvent clubs that qualifies for the Champions League every year. My bewilderment grew at the utter jubilation at wining the FA Cup, a competition they rarely grace with their first choice XI. They're not the only culprits though. If it's not a foul it HAS to be a dive. If he's out of form he's worst player in the club's history. Very often the lack of perspective is greater the less likely people are to actually go to matches. Added to the ability talk about football online and often anonymously people lose all perspective and most of their dignity and the levels of vitriol spiral out of control. But the Proustian rush of memories caused by peeling stickers from their backing and Montague's account of no hope minnows playing full of caused me to remember that I can do football on my terms. I've got my own perspective.
The counter argument is that I don't care enough. Possibly so. But I care enough for me. I'll go to Orient games, watch Match of the Day on Sunday mornings, have occasional outings to the pub to watch Sky games, go to some non league games and maybe a game here or there further afield. I'm not quite ready to give up on the game yet.
Now, there's a World Cup about to be on. I'll probably be back griping about Mick McCarthy very soon.
tldr: Football's shit but I still love it.
