Have you ever been told matter-of-factly, on a miserable Monday morning, that it’s “only a game”? Joel Slagle explains why football matters and that you’re not alone.
My wife doesn’t particularly care for football. She tolerates it, and generally leaves me to it when I watch a match at home. One Sunday though, she saw me getting more and more upset as my team was on the receiving end of – what I perceived to be – a series of increasingly poor refereeing decisions. My team lost 3-2 after having two men sent off and letting in a late winner. I seethed, and then my wife said it: “It’s only a game.”
But it isn’t, is it? In the 1997 film adaptation of Nicky Hornby’s Fever Pitch, Paul is feeling low following Arsenal’s draw at home to Derby County and his girlfriend tells him it’s only a game. He explodes and says, “it quite clearly isn’t ‘only a game.’ I mean, if it was, do you honestly think I’d care this much?!”
Why do I care this much? After all, this is just 22 men running around kicking a ball. There are plenty of bigger issues to address in the world, but I keep coming back to football. The fact you are reading this means I am not the only one.