So the World Cup started last night with an undeserved Brazil win over Croatia, set against a backdrop of FIFA corruption and rioting in Rio.
Which is good (really, it is!) because over the next four weeks I'm going write a few pieces on this here blog about my first World Cup as a dad, which as such is likely to be a bit of a different experience for me personally than the World Cups before it.
You see, until yesterday I don't think I've ever been less excited by an impending footie fest than I had been about this World Cup. And I usually get pretty excited about these things, being a football loving, season ticket holding kind of bloke.
I say 'football loving'. Truth is the last few years I've been increasingly disillusioned with the game.
Footballers are idiots for starters. Then the fact the sport is being ruined by a concentration of power, money and influence at the richest clubs. And all the while I'm also being fleeced by the club I support in terms of pricing for the aforementioned season ticket.
Plus, that team I support has been, well, a bit shit for quite a while (until a recent trophy got that monkey off our backs - yay!).
But look, us football fans aren't logical people - as Mrs East Herts Dad regularly points out, despite all my moaning I'm still happy to hand over my hard earned every year for the privilege of cheering the lads on.
And, in theory, an international football tournament in summertime can be a welcome distraction from the inevitable disappointment of the club football season [we'll cover the inevitable disappointment of international football itself in a later post - ed].
Which means I was struggling to work out why I wasn't in the mood for Brazil. Is it because, for once, there's literally no expectation that England will achieve anything? Nope. England haven't come with any expectation attached since Euro 96, for me at least. Too many disappointments.
Then it hit me. Time. I just haven't been able to indulge in the usual pre-World Cup ritual of pouring over the teams, stats, gossip, endless punditry, predictions and Panini sticker books (yep, as a grown adult I can still be found 'swapping' and 'needing' with friends and colleagues).
Work has been busy, for sure, but it's also The Boy, bless him. Guess what? Turns out when you have a six month old child, there just aren't the hours in the day (or evening) to waste on the above frivolities.
Gone are the times of World Cups and Euros past where I would WATCH EVERY GAME (or at least try to by sneaking out of work).
This time round I'm going to have to juggle the live matches on the tellybox with BabyTV's utterly delightful short animations during his evening feeds and pre-bed sleepy time. Not so much Thierry Henry as Hungry Henry. And there will certainly be less pub*.
But you know what? This is a good thing. Less pre-game build up on TV equals less Adrian Chiles.
And now that everything's underway in Brazil and with a couple of WC BBQs coming up over the weekend, I've belated joined in with the soccerball excitement.
So join me, dear readers, over the next month as the World Cup 2014 story unfolds alongside the nappy changes, feeding times and tantrums.
Life is good.
*This is very different to 'no pub'.
No comments:
Post a Comment