Football Cringe - Second Half

Something I was unaware of when I wrote, last night, about the MU yobs being in Lille was that the match was, in fact, being played 20km or so down the road in Lens. Small mercies. I needn’t have worried about the broken glass etc. On my way to the train this morning, I saw absolutely no evidence of any ill-effects suffered by the town as a result of the passing presence of the empty-headed red hordes (that is, the empty-headed red hordes of both teams – apparently Lille wear red too).

Seemingly, there was a bit of "handbags" in the match itself, someone being accused of breaking some loopy rule or other but, to the credit of the football fans from both nations, there wasn’t a hint of trouble at all amongst the supporters.

Ok, if you’re going to split hairs, not a hint of trouble apart from a small pitch invasion. Ok, a small pitch invasion and the real possibility of a repeat of the Hillsborough disaster. But nothing else……ok, ok, some tear gas was necessary…… alright, so a few people lost consciousness (they probably weren’t what I would call conscious at any point in the preceding 2 decades anyway). Right, I know! Some baton-charges, fighting and arrests but, apart from that, nobody at all seems to have born out my pre-match fears that the event might have some negative by-products.

Nobody there seems to have behaved like an infant or a mindless animal in any way and no-one appeared to be under any misapprehension that the “airbag manipulation” was, in any way, important…… or worth having tantrums over.

I stand corrected.

The photo at the top of this blog is of a scene at that very match. What a pack of brain-dead tossers. The saddest thing of all is that these cretins probably feel like there was something positive in it all. “Weren’t it, great, eh? Fuckin’ Froggy c*nts”. I can almost hear this ignorant drivel being grunted by these Neanderthals. Normally, one of the great things about being in this corner of France is that, as the major draws are things like architecture and War history, the type of person attracted here from Blighty is often someone with, at least, some cultural leanings. There are few things but football which could entice last night's turds to come in this direction and, if it happens again, whenever that might be, it will be way too soon. Oh, what it would be like to have wise people in the majority in this World of ours. Just think of how much nicer life would be………(louts would probably see a vision such as that as representing boredom, just as they would probably view a bleak and rugged coastline on a wild winter’s day as being “boring”. However, ignorant louts usually use the word boring to try to hide the fact that they're too thick to appreciate anything unless it smacks them in the face…… a Lille police officer’s baton, perhaps…. Nothing “boring” about one of those….. much more “bludgeoning” than “boring”, don’t you think?).

As wordy as I am and as bright as I like to think that I am, I can’t begin to express to you the contempt, despair and disappointment these situations give rise to in me and I don’t have the faintest idea as to how to try to rationalise these disgusting events and their protagonists. Furthermore, It’s so difficult to see where the solution to their perversity lies that I’m actually already beyond the tipping point and, as such, I’m no longer even sure that there’s a solution available at all.

I’m not one of these “those were the days” bods, forever harping on about better times in the past. As pleasant as some of it could be, the past is gone. We’re left with the present (this wretched and all-too predictable display of ignorance and violence last night) and we’re left with the future…. How the Hell do we do anything about it when, with every passing generation, the dross increasingly outnumber the decent.

I’ve got some solutions to offer but they go way beyond the subject of football-related yobbery and, as much as they never veer from the paths both of common sense and common good, I guess it would be fair to say that they “aren’t deemed fashionable ideas” these days. (I’m probably breaking some cretinous Euro-law just by musing on the kinds of solutions I’d love to see applied).

Another time, perhaps ;o)