Planet Jupitus: Lack of boots ruined my football education

At the weekend, rather than the metronomic tedium of Wimbledon I listened to Essex giving Yorkshire what for in the Friends Provident Trophy semi-finals. I must confess to cricket being a closed book to me. Like a tweedy Bletchley Park code-breaker, I squint at cricket statistics perspiring slightly. I occasionally buy a copy of Wisden for a mate, which sends him into paroxysms of delight. This puzzles me because it is just a book of names and numbers, ie, a telephone directory . . . 

I think the only reason I can't comprehend cricket is because I didn't play as a child. Same goes for football. I have nothing but glowing admiration for those of you who can watch 22 blokes running around and know exactly who should be where. This knowledge is forged in the fires of your childhood experience.

Please don't misunderstand me, I played football with my brother and mates all the time. One game, up against a municipal toilet wall in the park, was called “Cannon”. The aim was to kick the ball against the wall and have the rebound go as far away and at as acute an angle as possible to make it impossible for the next kicker to hit the wall.

Cannon might have been fun, but it didn't teach you any fundamentals. For that you needed a sporty dad, big brother or at least a pair of boots. I was without the first two and I could never convince my mum to buy the footwear. At Stanford Juniors you were selected not on merit but on ownership of a pair of Golas.

I remember the humiliation of standing on the touchline wearing slip-on plimsolls next to the similarly equipped Glyn Jenkins (violin maestro and deputy head teacher) and Philip Gazeley (international evangelist and session bass guitarist). The success in later life of we three geeks is my mother’s justification. It was her plan all along. “I didn’t buy you boots, Phillip, so you’d be a stand-up comedian and get a long-running TV pop quiz.” Thanks, Mum, but on reflection I’d rather be able to understand what George McCartney’s up to on Saturdays . . .

Comments

[Steve]

Sorry to say it Phil but it wasn't the lack of football boots... you were just a geek at school.

I know, because I too was the laughed at last pick.

Had you had boots and organised games to participate in you still would have bee crap and probably would have ended up even more humiliated.

Saying that I love, understand, and now work in, the sport world so I think the link you draw between your childhood sporting experiences and you inability to now comprehend sport are tenuous at best.

You're just not a sport fan - no shame in that.