The Big Match

I don’t recall the exact moment that I became a fan of a football club but the indoctrination to support Southampton started at an early age. Back in 1981, when I was just 7, I had a poster on my wall, given to me by my brother, of the Southampton squad. There on the poster stood a selection of shiny haired individuals beaming out at the world, but in amongst them was the most famous footballer of his day, Kevin Keegan.

It’s difficult to remember what a surprise it was in 1980 when Keegan joined Southampton. The equivalent now would be David Beckham signing for Blackpool. But there was the mighty permed one on the turf of The Dell along with our other stars of the day like Mick Channon and Alan Ball, staring down at me from my bedroom wall. When I went to school my friends would be supporters of more fashionable 80s clubs like Liverpool or Spurs but I stuck to my guns and that is why last night I was stood on the terraces at London Road, home of Peterborough United, being frozen to the core by the kind of harsh wind last felt by Captain Scott on his way to the South Pole.

I have heard that football is like theatre. That in the days of Shakespeare the average man and woman on the street would go along to a performance of 'Romeo and Juliet' or 'The Merry Wives of Windsor' and join in with the same sort of vigour, calling out to the performers on the stage about how Hamlet was offside and how Lady Macbeth should have gone to Specsavers. This of course doesn’t happen today, people don’t go to the West End to start shouting profanities during Andrew Lloyd-Webber musicals, although perhaps they should. It would certainly have made 'Cats' more interesting.

I did consider pointing out the ‘theatre of football’ analogy to my fellow Southampton fans but realised that they may not appreciate what I was saying and consider me an undesirable element, probably from the wrong end of the M27, and forcibly eject me in a thoroughly undignified manner.

I sort of get what is meant though. I find myself partly watching the crowd as much as the football, particularly those vocal individuals who, in amongst the seemingly nonsensical ranting, are painfully funny.

Much has been said of football chants by other more notable individuals than I but you gain a better understanding about your team from them. I heard yesterday via the medium of song that Rickie Lambert is lauded for being Southampton’s goal machine, that Lee Barnard is short and hard and, allegedly, wanted by Scotland Yard, and that Darren Ferguson is a……..well, perhaps this isn’t the forum for that sort of comment, but you take the point.

The great thing is you inevitably join in. There’s just no point going along to stand there in silence. The guy next to me seemed to be, on the face of it, a normal, sensible, smartly dressed man in his 50s who was quite reserved, but once the whistle blew he seemed to blurt out words and pepper sentences with profanities that would make a nun blush. The guy to my right said nothing as he had his radio on, presumably listening to the match commentary rather than finding some inner peace by listening to Classic FM, although being a Southampton fan can drive you to that sort of behaviour.

Then there is the pantomime of half time. Usually this is the time to get some liquid refreshment and/or go to the loo but I had a good spot so I didn’t want to move, however that meant that I was faced with the half time entertainment. I have seen all sorts of things over the years and this was nothing special.

We had a presentation to someone or other, a lap of honour by some local kids team who we all applauded, well most of us, I saw one chap gesturing at them, and a lap by someone dressed up in a giant mattress costume for some reason. It made me wish I’d gone and got a Hot Dog. I’d heard that in days gone by a brass band would come out and play which would be a welcome alternative to this half-arsed display.

Mind you, on a previous occasion when I came to London Road a giant Peperami was taking part in a goal scoring competition, to which my learned friend, Ned, pointed and shouted at the pitch “It’s a giant turd!!!” We may have been drinking beforehand.

The entertainment yesterday was in the game. If you’d told me at the start the final score would be 4-4 I’d have said fair enough, honours even, a game of two halves, and similar tired old clichés. As it was I felt that we lost the game having been two goals up twice during the 90 minutes. To be fair it was a good game to watch, end to end stuff, and lots of argy-bargy (you can’t help but revert to clichés when writing about football, maybe I could be a sports writer).

I, of course, remained calm and composed and not once shouted for the referee to be involved, well apart from the moment caught on slow-mo replay on Sky Sports when Chaplow was brought down in the penalty area and I can be clearly seen in the crowd with my mouth open. That and the moment when we scored the second goal and I was caught, again in slow motion, reacting to the goal about a second after everyone else, as if I was on satellite delay.

Mind you, I couldn’t be missed in my Saints hat that doesn’t quite fit my head. It kept riding up into a point so every now and then on the TV coverage you can catch sight of a guy in the crowd, just behind the goal, looking like a garden gnome. That’ll be me then.

At the final whistle the Peterborough fans were jubilant and we were initially a little deflated. After all, we were the same team that last week held off Manchester United, supposedly the best team in the country, for over an hour. This time we couldn’t hold back the Posh. Don’t ask me why they’re called that, I really have no idea, and I sort of don’t want to either. There really should be some investigation by Trading Standards, I mean have you seen Barry Fry?

So I made my way back to the car to meet up with the present Mrs Hayward and the wife-in-waiting as they had been down the opposite end with the locals. Despite feeling that my team had run out of steam during the second half I felt exhilarated and really want to go to the next match.

That’s what a live game of football does to you. Television is a marvellous invention but it doesn’t quite capture the atmosphere of being at a live game. I would defy anyone to go to a football match and not enjoy it. It doesn’t have to be football, try rugby or motor racing, or even cheese rolling, they come alive when you’re actually there.

Who knows, it might have inspired me into actually doing some exercise today. After all, it’s February now and there’s a little thing of those New Year resolutions.