Cornish Piskie
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- May 18, 2017
- Messages
- 450
- Reaction score
- 265
- Points
- 63
- Location
- Penzance, Cornwall
- Supports
- Charlton Athletic
In England, there is something rather special about football at Christmas time. OK, so for a number of years there has been talk of a winter break, perhaps even over the holiday, but I believe this would be a disaster for the English game, which is wedded to the deeper rhythms of our winter rituals, that shared folk memory of holiday football as a sort of beano.... a spree, a communal release from the holiday routine – not to mention being a part of a more generalised fightback against Christmas itself. In many ways, football shouldn't belong at Christmas, but it does because it is a valuable addition to the holiday season.
There are various reasons for this enduring chemistry. Strange things happen at this time. The players suddenly seem more familial and pack-like. Goal celebrations become even more elaborate and well rehearsed than usual; manifestations of the holiday mood in the manner of a child who has found an unexpectedly wonderful new toy in his Xmas stocking. There will be scoreline oddities, not to mention season-saving moments of personal redemption for those whose performances have been less than glorious so far.
We loved a player like Mario Ballotelli who, strangely child-like, had a certain Christmas air about him at all times. Somehow, you couldn’t help feeling that he was the man most likely to play a match while wearing a Santa hat, or come off the bench late in the game carrying a sack of presents over his shoulder. During his behaviouraly erratic, yet crowd-fixingly stay at Manchester City he did the next best thing, scoring a walking pace hat-trick against Aston Villa just after Christmas with the almost embarrassed air of an awkward child playing Jingle Bells on the electronic keyboard his grandmother gave him for a present.
There seems to be a certain infrastructure to Christmas football. Although Christmas Day matches are history, the Boxing Day derby seems to be a thing of the past, and next day return fixtures are long gone, festive football still draws huge crowds, largely made up of fans willing to endure long journeys of three - lane gridlock on the motorways or grudgingly staffed rail networks, to attend away games.
Perhaps it's the basic notion of escape that underpins festive football, as it is an intrinsic part of Christmas that mostly, we want to somehow get the whole business over and done with as quickly as possible. Football gives us an escape…. An opportunity to get out of the house, breathe in the fresh, cold December air and forget about being trapped in the madhouse with over excited children and relatives that you don’t see at any other time of the year.
Football offers not just a means of escape from the bonds of ritual festivity but it is also a way of losing yourself in something larger. This is the deep soul of English football. Over the holiday season it will be our love of watching 22 pampered, multi-millionaire prima donnas kicking a ball around that provides the escape hatch and renews again our affection for the ability of these itinerant, unruly entertainers to usher in a new year with an affirmation of football’s unique place in each fan’s individual alternative world.
Come on, fess up.... we love it.
There are various reasons for this enduring chemistry. Strange things happen at this time. The players suddenly seem more familial and pack-like. Goal celebrations become even more elaborate and well rehearsed than usual; manifestations of the holiday mood in the manner of a child who has found an unexpectedly wonderful new toy in his Xmas stocking. There will be scoreline oddities, not to mention season-saving moments of personal redemption for those whose performances have been less than glorious so far.
We loved a player like Mario Ballotelli who, strangely child-like, had a certain Christmas air about him at all times. Somehow, you couldn’t help feeling that he was the man most likely to play a match while wearing a Santa hat, or come off the bench late in the game carrying a sack of presents over his shoulder. During his behaviouraly erratic, yet crowd-fixingly stay at Manchester City he did the next best thing, scoring a walking pace hat-trick against Aston Villa just after Christmas with the almost embarrassed air of an awkward child playing Jingle Bells on the electronic keyboard his grandmother gave him for a present.
There seems to be a certain infrastructure to Christmas football. Although Christmas Day matches are history, the Boxing Day derby seems to be a thing of the past, and next day return fixtures are long gone, festive football still draws huge crowds, largely made up of fans willing to endure long journeys of three - lane gridlock on the motorways or grudgingly staffed rail networks, to attend away games.
Perhaps it's the basic notion of escape that underpins festive football, as it is an intrinsic part of Christmas that mostly, we want to somehow get the whole business over and done with as quickly as possible. Football gives us an escape…. An opportunity to get out of the house, breathe in the fresh, cold December air and forget about being trapped in the madhouse with over excited children and relatives that you don’t see at any other time of the year.
Football offers not just a means of escape from the bonds of ritual festivity but it is also a way of losing yourself in something larger. This is the deep soul of English football. Over the holiday season it will be our love of watching 22 pampered, multi-millionaire prima donnas kicking a ball around that provides the escape hatch and renews again our affection for the ability of these itinerant, unruly entertainers to usher in a new year with an affirmation of football’s unique place in each fan’s individual alternative world.
Come on, fess up.... we love it.