I guess the World Cup starts on Saturday. Drums fingers on desk. Stares out of the window at the cars going past sporting England flags. I wish I could muster up a bit of enthusiasm but I can’t. Of course I want England to win. Of course I do. But I know that at some point soon I’ll be so sick of the damn thing that I’ll secretly wish for them to be knocked out so I don’t have to hear about it anymore. When that thought comes I’ll keep it to myself.

My husband, of course, can’t wait. He’ll be commandeering the remote for the next few weeks, while I sit upstairs reading. I suggested to him the other day that the best football matches are the ones where your team is losing right up until the last few minutes. And at the last possible moment they score twice and win. Apparently they’re not the best games; a sentiment echoed around the office the other day.

One thing I do like about the World Cup is the party atmosphere. Everyone (apart from me apparently) will be tuning in and watching the same matches at the same time. When England score we’ll hear the cheers drifting in through the open windows, cars will toot their horns and strangers will nod and smile and comment on the game. It isn’t often that we have this sense of belonging and collective pride.

I’ll leave you with this ad from Carlsberg.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 9th, 2010 at 2:04 pm and is filed under Lord Levy, Me. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.