Observations on the under 17's football match
or: Monika annoys everyone around her
It’s very cold but the boys have their knees out. Aren’t they cold? Do they get cold during the in-between bits when they aren’t running but standing around, waiting?
Everyone in the stands is suddenly a football expert. I am a football expert.
When they head the ball I feel very concerned. Heading should be banned. I have said this before and am usually met with exasperation. I say it now quietly but no one hears me, becuase I said it so quietly.
Also I forgot my glasses.
The woman in front of me is eating ICE CREAM, what an icon. It is January 22nd.
One boy kicked a ball into another boy’s HEAD (by accident) and no one cried? I feel like someone should have cried. If I had known him I might have cried.
It’s kinda wild that they have to fight each other and fight for the ball. I wonder if the need to constantly be vigilant can be shrugged off when they exit the pitch.
Stressed parents forget English and pray, curse, shout and love in their mother tongues. Beautiful.
More positions needed. Twenty players vs twenty players would be fun! I would watch that with even more interest. Or perhaps if they had to dodge certain cheerful objects. (Say, large beach balls?)
Very watery hot chocolate 2/10. It tastes like someone poured boiling water into an empty Cadburys Hot Chocolate tin. Everyone warned me against getting the hot chocolate and I now understand why. But it’s three degrees out and the only alternative was black coffee. At half eight in the evening.
They don’t fall over as much as I expect them to. I think if I were needing to concentrate on this many things at the same time (other players, coaches, parents, the crowd, the ball, your own feet, the mud) I would be falling over a lot. I can see why that boy accidentally kicked the other one in the head now.
Is the cost to these boys worth it?
I’ve learnt I only enjoy football when we’re winning.