World Cup Nonsense

[Mid Life Crisis Marathon Man]

I'm sorry, it may be un-patriotic, treacherous even, but I just can't get excited by all the World Cup hysteria over here.

It's not that I have anything especially against the Socceroos, and indeed I will be very pleased for them if they do well, but I can't pretend to be part of it. Perhaps I could be best described as the polite bystander, quietly sinking a few brews and smiling at everybody else having a great time.

The whole Socceroo hype for me is a lot like the recent Commonwealth Games - suddenly we were all supposed to be hysterically excited about gymnastics, synchronised platform diving or skeet shooting. Sports we completely ignore even when they're free to watch any Saturday afternoon; suddenly we're paying exhorbitant ticket prices and pretending we understand even the most abstruse rules of these sports, for a whole two weeks; faking it like crazy and then forgetting all about them until the next Olympics.

Soccer, sorry "football", is somewhat like that for me. Now we're all supposed to be experts on the merits of the 4-4-3 formation at home versus the 5-4-2 away, depending on whether you have one or two pacey strikers (or something)... I'm just not that clued up about it.

And according to the cock-heads in the pub I've just been in, I'm a moron for not knowing that Ante Covic usually plays for Hammarby in Sweden. Thank goodness I didn't let on that I didn't even know he was a goalkeeper :o

So I'd like to say here and now that I'm bowing out early. I can't name more than about four Socceroos even when sober and would struggle to tell any of them apart from members of the male Welsh choir... unless they sang a few bars maybe.

The thing is that despite trying (I even subscribed to "Shoot!" magazine as a kid), I've just never been much of a soccer fan. I played it at school but my career as a left winger was short lived and was never witnessed by any talent scouts, who in any case may have pondered the wisdom of a completely right-footed player traipsing down the wrong side of the pitch.

I wish the Socceroos well. But I can't pretend to be inner sanctum on this one.

But I do enjoy reading everyone's comments