There was a time when I was a fan of football and could have provided you with any snippet of information you wanted. I was even able to predict what the table would look like once the dust had settled at five o’clock on a Saturday teatime. In the days before we were all on the Internet I used to keep newspaper cuttings in a file and had every single edition of the ‘pink’ newspaper that the Evening Gazette brought out on Saturday evening. For no other reason than it is where I was living when I got into football, I supported Middlesbrough and watched them bounce between the Premiership and the First Division and reach two cup finals in one season (the same season they were relegated) and one final the following season. When I moved to Southend I maintained my love of ‘the Boro’ despite the piss taking it used to get me. In fact I still have a forfeit to honour should I ever go back there, as I once drunkenly announced that if Middlesbrough didn’t finish in the top five I would do a streak at Roots Hall on the first home game of the following season. I never fulfilled my side of that bet as I moved away with my soon to be wife, (‘dragged away to get me away from my friends by a control freak who robbed me of four years’ is a more accurate description to be honest), and I am reminded of this every so often. The other big excitement besides club football was of course the internationals every two years; who can forget the euphoria of Euro ’96 and that goal from Paul Gascoigne? David Beckham’s booking for kicking that effectively ended France ’98? My favourite was the 2002 World Cup that was held in Japan and because of the time difference the pubs were allowed to open really early in the morning. Of course that was back in my heavy drinking days and I was able to go to work after the match whereas now I’d be heading home for bed.

One day without explanation I found that I no longer cared about the game and stopped watching it. To this day I cannot get excited or even vaguely interested in football and don’t even know who half the people on the pitch are. I know the Premiership isn’t the top league anymore as they changed it all around again, I don’t know what league Middlesbrough are in these days or if they even still exist. The World Cup starts today (I think) and I am annoyed at the way that Eastenders is being moved around the schedules.

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