The Sporting Spirit

George Orwell's first published work is reputed to be a childhood letter written to the Henley Standard. He went onto be educated at Eton but despite his local origins I think its safe to say that unlike former Magpie and Etonian teacher Andy Jennings' pupils he never went to watch football at York Road. His opposition to organised competitive sport was later articulated in his essay entitled "The Sporting Spirit". The following passage sums up the article and contains one of his most famous phrases: 

"People want to see one side on top and the other side humiliated, and they forget that victory gained through cheating or through the intervention of the crowd is meaningless. Even when the spectators don't intervene physically they try to influence the game by cheering their own side and "rattling" opposing players with boos and insults. Serious sport has nothing to do with fair play. It is bound up with hatred, jealousy, boastfulness, disregard of all rules and sadistic pleasure in witnessing violence: in other words it is war minus the shooting."

Strong stuff indeed, but at a time when an individual deems it right to send Neil Lennon a parcel bomb, simply for being the manager of Celtic, does Orwell have a point? All too often something will happen during a televised game to move the commentator to say something along the lines of football being "put into perspective". Does the mere fact that we need reminding about the need for such perspective prove Orwell right, that we are all too eager to adopt "the lunatic modern habit of identifying oneself with large power units and seeing everything in terms of competitive prestige?". Maybe? Or maybe not?

With his impeccable upper class origins Orwell singularly failed to understand the function of sport, which is to escape the workaday worries of the nine to five grind and vent your frustrations for ninety minutes before going back to reality. It took the son of a miner, Bill Shankly, in one of the most misunderstood footballing quotes to perfectly capture the real meaning of the sporting spirit: "Someone said to me 'To you football is a matter of life or death!' and I said 'Listen, it's more important than that'." With his tongue firmly in his cheek Shanks conveys the power of the game to blank out all that really matters in life for the duration of the match you are watching so that when the final whistle goes your emotions are spent ready for you to leave planet football for planet earth.

Yet I feel this is only true for those of us who actually attend matches and therefore create real relationships with everyone else involved. This cannot be the same for those who confine themselves to the sphere of TV, radio and the internet. Here relations become detached giving rise to the demons that Orwell warned against. Many view non league as "real" football. In my mind all football watched live at the ground is real and to some extent I wish a replacement could be found for the non league tag. Certainly the best way to keep it real is close your mind to the rubbish spouted by the media to maintain perpetually overhyped headlines and instead stick to the genuine sporting spirit, that of bearing witness to the game in the flesh and enjoying the heady emotions created by those around you.

European Nights

One of the few drawbacks of being a Maidenhead fan is that our away trips rarely see us travel outside of the South of England. The prospect of a game overseas barring a trip over the Severn bridge or to Canvey Island is non existent. Yet growing up during an age when English clubs ruled Europe gave me a sense that a midweek tie on the continent was the height of glamour and sophistication with even the home leg providing a taste of something different.

Up until this season watching European games has been an almost exclusively armchair pursuit for me but in the summer I decided I would spend my free Tuesday nights sampling the best live European fare the capital had to offer.

Perhaps because of blanket TV coverage European football seems to be of less interest than the Premiership a fact borne out by the cheaper prices for tickets.

Thus over the last few months I have seen Chelsea, Fulham and Arsenal take on some of Europe's top teams for what was in the case of the West London teams a cheaper price than visiting the QPR's championship boutique.

Of course the attraction of seeing foreign players in the flesh has somewhat lessened with their preponderance in the Premiership but the massed ranks of opposition fans doubtless boosted by ex pats based in London has ensured that the games are something of a spectacle.

This was certainly true of the Porto fans at Chelsea although the strong showing of the red and green Portuguese colours suggested this was more of a cause for national celebration for the strong West London contingent from the Iberian peninsula.

Nevertheless they gave tremendous support to their team with a long song to the tune of Bonnie Tyler's Heartbreak being the highlight. This proved to be in vain as the influence of Ancelotti was already showing with a 1-0 win to the Blues in classic Catenaccio style.

My seat in the middle tier of the iconic East Stand gave me a perfect view of the action and also allowed me to observe Chelsea fans old and new in the next row. The strains of Blue is the Colour and the Liquidator were received with much excitement by a 40 something couple who were clearly being transported by the music back to a youth spent in the Shed. Meanwhile a few seats along some nouveau soccer fans bemoaned Essien's completion rate. The stand itself althoughh cutting edge 30 years ago is beginning to show its age. Particularly when contrasted with the splendour of the Emirates (pictured), definitely the best modern ground I've been to and a perfect setting for the epicurean stylings of Wenger's footballing aesthetes.

Although Olympiakos and Alkmaar were well beaten their supporters impressed, the Greeks eager to prove their title as Europe's air punching champions whilst the Dutch offered a well rehearsed Ring of Fire sung as a round. It was surprising then that the only hail hail from the much vaunted Celtic support was the hail of bottles which greeted Eduardo's penalty winning genuflection.

Perhaps Europe will be the North London Mozarts' best chance of glory this season, Fulham however don't quite seem to have the quality in depth to sustain a Europa league run. Their clash with Roma did provide the best match atmosphere, the capacity Craven Cottage crowd ensuring the game remained at fever pitch throughout.

I sat in the Stevenage Road Haynes stand, reputedly the oldest in the world, nevertheless I seemed to have a better view of proceedings than the two goalline assistants who remained superfluous despite some controversial goal mouth incidents and will surely go the same way of kick ins when the competition ends. The match was thrilling to watch with goals, a dismissal, a penalty miss and a stoppage time equaliser to exemplify the great entertainment a European night has to offer.

A Shot At Glory

The world of cinema has regularly tried to translate the thrilling spectacle of football to the silver screen with mixed results. With the game often being stranger than fiction, football drama tends to err on the side of contrived and predictable. Nevertheless football films are usually an enjoyable watch although not always for the right reasons.One recent classic of the genre doing the rounds on Freeview at the moment is "A Shot At Glory", a bizarre Hollywood attempt to capture the magic of the Cup.Featuring the marquee names of Robert Duvall and Michael Keaton, the film follows the fortunes of lowly Scottish team Kilnockie. Wealthy American owner Peter Cameron (Keaton) has bought the club and has a dream to move the club MK Dons style to Dublin. To prevent this wily old manager Gordon McLeod (Duvall) has to bring success to the moribund club. To help him do this Cameron buys star Celtic striker Jackie McQuillan, who just happens to be the estranged husband of McLeod's daughter Kate.Here the fun and games start off screen as McQuillan is played by Rangers legend Ally McCoist. This leads to some bizarre footage of McQuillan's early career inserted into the early part of the film. This footage shows McCoist scoring goals for Rangers from his real career, but because the Director wants to show McQuillan's past the famous blue Rangers shirts are coloured green! This was an alleged pay off for acceding to McCoist's request that the top team in the film was Rangers!Anyway back to the film. Of course Kilnockie despite being behind in every game somehow manage to secure promotion and a place in the Scottish Cup Final despite Duvall's strange attempt at a Scottish accent and team talks limited to "If you score more goals than the other team, then you will win".The match footage shot at Dumbarton, Queen of the South and Kilmarnock is not bad with the extras being supplied by Raith Rovers. Several real life football stars had speaking roles including John McVeigh, Peter Hetherston, Didier Agathe, Ally Maxwell, Owen Coyle and Claudio Reyna. Unfortunately the scenes on the terraces isn't quite so convincing with actors dressed in all manner of Kilnockie merchandise not quite getting it right.I won't spoil the ending by telling you what happens in the Cup Final, but I doubt you need me to tell you that everyone is reconciled off it, including Duvall and his managerial Nemesis Brian Cox who plays Rangers head honcho Martin Smith.All in all a wonderfully wasteful way to spend a couple of hours of the festive holiday once you’ve gorged yourself on mince pies and sherry. Ally McCoist is by far the best thing in the film. You would be hard pushed to tell he wasn't an actor and his footballing ability speaks for itself. Duvall on the other hand whilst looking like the stereotypical craggy Scottish Manager spoils the illusion every time he opens his mouth. All set to a score by Mark Knopfler, Local Hero it ain't, but it is head and shoulders above some of the other football films of recent times.
Watch It: A Shot At Glory is probably still available in the budget section of your local DVD emporium.