The Beautiful Game: 

“For me, football is more than a sport.  Look at the impact it has on society.” 

• Kylian Mbappe. 

And so, that’s it for just under eighteen months.  The innate pragmatism of Southgate meets the cerebral energy of Mancini.  Someone was always going to pay the penalty.   

Football is a unifying force.  Like all forces though: both invisible and no-one really holds the rules of what it opens.   

I am a keen football fan (Liverpool).  Tournaments are festivals and therefore time to cancel reality for a month, settle down for three matches a day, wonder if I will ever get a full album of Panini stickers and players, I’ve never heard of getting linked to my beloved Reds.  As a result, I spend the hours between games checking YouTube sizzle reels and Flight Tracker. 

My oldest friend is a Tranmere Rovers fan.  I can remember shivering on the terraces; watching them lose on a cold Saturday before Christmas to Wimbledon, making a sharp exit to the pub on 85mins.  I can also remember them beating Man City, with the away end singing “We’re shit and we’re sick of it.” 

 

I know, ancient history.  See also winning tickets to Euro 96.  Sitting in Anfield, watching The Czech Republic beat Italy.  My brother having a “polite word” with an Italian fan, so incensed by Pierluigi Casiraghi missing a sitter; he was attempting some foot-based percussive maintenance on the seat ahead of him.   

Combine this with my love of Liverpool and you could say it's not just in my blood, but in my DNA.   

But when those tournaments come around, my love becomes a more public, shared thing.  Which is not just an egalitarian, but a logical one.  Everyone watches The Euros and The World Cup.  People become experts on players and systems.  They tether their soul to a country, for a variety of reasons.   

So, we’re back at the old patriotism thing.  The blind, unstinting, uncritical look at your country.  Wherever that is.  And we’ve seen many instances of that at the Euros.   

Let’s start at Hungary’s refusal to take the knee.  Players from a right-wing kakistocracy, where homophobia and transphobia are legislated. UEFA intervened in an attempt by Bayern Munich to light up the Allianz Arena for the match with Germany in gay pride colours.   

Funnily enough, The Europa League Final is in Hungary next year.  Perhaps UEFA could spend more time worrying about this, then ensuring bottles of Coke or Heineken are in shot in press conferences.   

Ah, a right-wing kakistocracy.  A government of politicians, who say that they are not politicians.  Casually racist, reactive, specialising in dog-whistles to those who consider themselves disenfranchised?   

Seems vaguely familiar.    

Over the last month, the phrase “Full Kit Wanker” has been redefined. Mainly by Priti Patel, a woman whose favourite sport is watching kids drown, expressing a love of football.  And Boris Johnson wearing an England shirt over a collar and tie. 

Football and politics are like binary chemical weapons.  They shouldn't be mixed, as the results are toxic.  Patel and Johnson are dogs, sniffing the national mood and using it to make them look slightly more normal, more human, more like the banjo Plucker's who put them in power.  

See also, Nigel Farage rocking up to Wembley in a union jack waistcoat, after dismissing BLM as a “far left Marxist organisation.”.  This is the sort of argument that an A Level politics student, or a rational human being could see through. 

I supported England as I live here.  Simple, really.  I was disappointed by France and The Netherlands will always let you down.  I refuse to support Portugal as their star player is a narcissist.  Though his mid-match arguments with Liverpool's Jota were hilarious, reminiscent of a soon to be divorced couple on a make-or-break holiday. 

However, I could never truly get behind En-ger-land.  Not just in footballing terms - the overt caution of it infuriated me.  No, it was more than that.  It was the booing of the national anthem of an opponent.  It was that lovely song about the bombing of Dresden.  And the song “We hate Scousers.” 

Following on from this: the racist abuse of Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bukayo Saka for the simple act of missing a penalty.  If we follow that line of logic, if you’re black and play for England you’re ok.  If you miss it, you are a target for the opinions of bellends.   

So, you can see why I find it hard to really feel like an England fan.  Not all of them are fucking idiots, but the ones we see are.  There is a flag at Anfield that says “We are Scouse, not English.” And I don’t just believe that, I understand it.  When Liverpool players are seen as superfluous to the England team (either by birth or team) I’m mystified as to why.  But conversely, I am glad they are not part of it.   

I support a team which is made of players from (amongst others) England, Holland, Brazil, Senegal and Egypt.  It’s managed by a man who is not just a devout Christian, but a socialist. The team does charitable works in the not just the local, but international community.  If football is a model of society, then here is the purest version of it. Unity, charity, synergy, acceptance.    

But racism, a disrespect for any flag other than your own, an overflowing bandwagon of chancers, comparing it to war...? That’s not beautiful.  And it’s certainly not part of the beautiful game.