The Prodigal

Sleep, the final frontier eluded me last night, I'm a bit grumpy. I'm grumpier still to find that TV5 has stabbed me in the back - they are delaying their newscast for an hour because of FOOTBALL, the final insult.

How obsessed are British people with football? Well, pretty bloody obsessed really. When I lived in Woking in Surrey, it was for the most part avoidable. Footie was a largely male preserve and we were near enough to London for the majority of them to support one of the London teams, although there was always a default setting, Manchester United. When Austen lived in London, in Earl's Court, I had occasion to have to drive up there one Sunday. No-one sane ever drives into central London, it's like taking your space ship too close to the sun, and in any case, entirely avoidable since public transport in and around the capital is excellent. As I went through Fulham, the streets were lined with people dressed in Chelsea blue all walking in the same direction. They seemed to be hypnotised or sleep-walking, they were everywhere, some act of public worship had to be taking place. There was, although this was Fulham, which has its own club, called appropriately Fulham, they were going towards the ground where Chelsea play. I had never before witnessed anything like this, most certainly these were not the famous British football hooligans, although they exist as I found out later, no, these were genuine fans.

When I moved to Portmouth in 2001, I moved to a city of one football club. Pompey. Their strip was also blue, maybe slightly darker than Chelsea's. Everyone, woman, man, indeterminate, they all supported the one club. I couldn't escape the football. When I used to travel back to Woking on a Saturday, I always knew if Pompey were playing at home because as I approached the station there would be police lining the bridge over the tracks. One time I remember arriving back on the last train and Pompey had won some important match. It seemed as though the entire city was on the railway station celebrating, but no, as I rode back to my flat, in fact the entire city was out in the entire city celebrating. All night party.

The biggest rivalry was between Pompey and Southampton, 'the Scummers'. It seemed that Southampton also referred to Pompey as Scummers, some universally acknowledged term of abuse, scummers being the most lowly job in the dockyards that defined both cities.
At one point, Pompey won a big victory against the Scummers. How did they celebrate? Well, some Pompey fans, led on police video-tape by boys from the school where I taught, trashed Pompey, killed a police dog, tore things down, wrecked cars and anything that came in their path. This was vile on so many levels when you think how much the whole city, the good people, love their team, this game.

At some point a teacher in my department who was being given a hard time by a really shitty class, complained to me that every time he turned to the board, they all said 'Blue Army.'
I didn't understand, what did that mean?
'Blue Army,' he said as though by repeating it I would get it. The blue army are apparently Pompey. I never figured out why they would say that in particular, I had no suggestions for him apart from ignore them, but he was a conscientious teacher, it went away.

The police in Portsmouth had their work cut out dealing with the antagonism between the two cities. I can remember one afternoon being at the end of the road where I lived, the seafront, when I realised that there was a huge phalanx of men moving down the road. It truly seemed to be in some kind of Roman army formation, a square of football fans with police at the front and back and down each side. Yes, another Pompey v Scummers confrontation was to take place.

There were days at school where you literally didn't sit down until the teaching itself was finished and you could do your paperwork. I would be there from around 7.30 until about 18.00 and would do lunch duty every day and break duty twice a week. One day on lunch duty, a kid threw a bottle at my head. Although schools in Britain often have police officers attached to the school, police officers and teachers have a mutual understanding, but ours were not in that day, so on my way home from work I had to go to the police station and make a report, and this was where I discovered another football related phenomenon. I had picked the wrong day to get hit in the head. The following day, England were playing in Europe and all the known hooligans were having to hand their passports in at the Cop Shop.

At some time during my final year in Portsmouth, the fans received a mighty blow. Pompey's manager, Harry Redknapp had been headhunted by Southampton. I would not have been surprised had the whole city worn mourning for a year and all flags had been flown at half mast. And yet, only a couple of months ago, the news that Harry has returned to Pompey is big enough to make the national papers, so I read it in the Guardian. Do the fans line the streets with pitchforks? Oh no, they love him, they want him back. The prodigal son returns.

I still don't get football. I have been blamed for it a lot. Whenever France won a match against England, it was my fault, if Germany won that was my fault too, I can remember being booed as I walked across the quad with another colleague who taught German. Didn't mean a thing to me, but he was a football fan, he had wanted England to win, that was harsh.
Having lived in Pompey however, I get what it means to people. The sense of community in Portsmouth was strong and I don't know whether this was because of the footie, but it sure as hell reflected it.