Cod Almighty | Diary
Yowsa yowsa yowsa!
6 August 2021
Football's kicking off! Well, most of it is. Down in the Bananaramanarama, the land where time stood still, we still have to wait another two weeks to score our football, Charlie. Has anyone come up with an explanation for this tardiness? There may be one on the internet somewhere, but that would mean research, which is kryptonite to BOTB diary.
The loss of innocence is associated with a lot of things – the onset of sexuality, the rites of grief and mourning, the witnessing of one of life's many horrors, realising Richard Madeley has fans. But to me the big one is when the child realises that most adults aren't the all-seeing all-knowing demigods he or she supposed, but in fact broken children in wrinkly bodies. I remember reading a book on close encounters when I was about thirteen and being most impressed with the middle-aged couple who were abducted by aliens and told the secrets of the universe. At that age I simply didn't realise that adults were mostly struggling fruitcakes jam-packed with neuroses, and that they would lie, imagine, misunderstand or mislead. After all, adults were parents, teachers, prime ministers and other world leaders, so I took the abduction story as grown-up gospel.
As an adult, the fact that Donald Trump is a greatly damaged, inadequate and clueless human being is obvious – as a child, one would possibly imagine he was the personification of power, maturity and authority – the ultimate headmaster. His comments on the USA Womens' World Cup team are hilarious, and I urge you to read them. In fact, if you are a child, read them and find out what I mean about most adults being broken children. You can trust me on this information. After all, I'm an adult. Sort of.
Part of this loss of innocence is realising that when football is organised badly it is usually because it has been organised by idiots. They do not have access to arcane wisdom that influences their decisions. They just aren't very bright, or they are lazy, or probably a combination of the two. Many football managers probably don't have a deep understanding of the game, but rely on shouting and luck for any success they achieve. The bullies in the school playground go on to be bullies on the football pitch, and a good defender owes his success at least partially to being good at kicking and intimidating people.
I have a friend who was, until recently, the next-door neighbour of a decent town player from the nineties; he describes the experience of living in close proximity to this GTFC hero as being like stuck in a Jeremy Kyle show on endless loop. I remember going to a reserve team game in the early nineties and standing right behind the reserve team coach at that time. His oft-repeated sole words to the team during play – I'm not making this up – were "kick it!" and "fukinell!" Giz a job. I could do that. There are fewer grown-ups in football than you might think. Our new owner gives the impression of being an adult whereas our previous one was clearly a broken child. Fingers crossed.
The concept of National Treasures is partially, I think, influenced by apparent maturity. Judi Dench, Joanna Lumley, David Attenbrough – all give the sense of being the adults in the room, whereas popular but prattish celebrities like Jeremy Clarkson or Bono are clearly children and will never achieve NT status. Having said that, Paul Gascoigne. That's my whole argument destroyed. Oh well. It wasn't a treasured one.
Which leads me on to cricket. Now I love cricket, and the cricket season used to dovetail nicely with the footy season. Footy in winter. Cricket in summer. So why are test matches now being played in September, when the nation's sport-hungry souls are eagerly focusing on the footy? Whose idea was that? When I was younger, I would have trusted that the adults knew best, and just accepted it. Now I think that they are just not very smart. Perhaps they are brainiacs and I'm just too dense to realise the sense behind it. After all, I'm not immune to laziness and stupidity, as you have probably gathered, if you've made it this far.
By the way, there are another two of these BOTB bobbin-bags to go before the footy season starts. You lucky people.
No newsbangs so far today. By all accounts our pre-season has been mixed but generally an injury-bollocked mire of meh. Tomorrow I'm Boston bound; I hear it is beautiful at this time of the year, and I look forward to it eagerly, which is of course the way eagles look forward to everything. So, next Friday, I might have a footballing opinion or two rather than this Peter Beagrie style dead-end dribbling.
Yabba Dabba Steve Kabba Do.