A lesson in British culture: Football

the stadium

Well, I guess it was inevitable that I would attend a football game, having recently moved to the football-mad capital of the world. I do like the sport, but more in a World Cup kinda way than an ‘I passionately support one team and hate any other team and all its supporters’ way, which I guess proves how un-English I am!

Brendan’s parents are both originally from Nottingham, and his Dad has always supported Nottingham Forest; I have recently been informed that “we” also support Forest, which I am quite happy to do; Nottingham is a cool place, Robin Hood was awesome…I don’t have any other preference…so Forest it is!! We got tickets to see them play the Queens Park Rangers at the Rangers’ stadium in London.

It was an…experience! The actual game was pretty good, but really, the game isn’t the focus for the people watching. The banter – and outright abuse – between the teams seems to be the main point of the whole exercise! The chants, jeers and songs were ceaseless; most of them I can’t bear to repeat, but there was one that didn’t contain any unsavoury words, chanted by the Forest supporters to the QPR fans in reference to their stadium: “my garden shed is bigger than this”.

Unfortunately, the match coincided with New York Fashion Week, and I happened to be checking Twitter for updates when Forest scored their only goal of the game, but I still enjoyed the whole experience – I don’t think I’ll be frequenting football matches, but at least I know something of what they’re all about!