Well, just over 24 hours to go to the start of the world cup. The excitement must be palpable in my house as the dog is suddenly on heat. I have made the transfers in my FIFA fantasy team and, barring any more injuries, am happy with my starting 11. And of course, I have posted the interactive world cup calendar on my Facebook profile, so that when I get to London it will be easier to plan social engagements with friends. These will be divided into two separate categories: ones that involve catching up, drinking and watching footie and ones that involve the first two but not the last.
Obviously, it is all about watching loads of good footie. But the best bit of the hype and tradition and the fun is about supporting your team in truly tribal fashion until the inevitable heartache. Part of the ritual, if you are an England fan, is drinking a lot of alcohol and flying the flag of St George. (Not that I would personally fly the flag but I did once wear a St George’s plastic bowler hat that I got from The Sun newspaper during England’s famous 5-1 defeat of Germany, so maybe I should!) The Sun is predictably going to be giving away flags with the paper on Saturday, ahead of England’s first fixture in Rustenburg. And while some organisations have banned the flag in England, our new leader, Dave the man, has decided to fly the flag above Downing Street for the duration of the competition.
I say good for Dave. For too many years, those politically correct killjoys have made this kind of display unacceptable. Their argument being that it might offend ethnic minorities. Well let’s think about that. Why would it offend them? Many ethnic minorities born in the UK see themselves as British or English and want to fly the flag for the world cup to support their national team. It was an ethnic minority Tory MP, Nadhim Zahawi, who urged the PM at Question Time yesterday to support the England team in this way.
You have to ask what the sentiments are behind flying a flag. If national flags are flown to support a national football team, why would that offend anyone? It will only exclude people who have no interest in football (who cares about them anyway?) or people from a different country who are supporting their own team. And they are free to fly their own flags and usually do. On these occasions flags have nothing to do with colonialism or any other accusation thrown at them. If flags are flown on national holidays that celebrate contentious periods or events in history, that could be offensive on the other hand. But that has nothing to do with football.
Now I am wondering if Dave Cameron has got hold of a copy of the list of 20 expletives that has been given to the Brazilian ref and his team in preparation for Saturday’s match against the US. I can just see him sitting in a bar at Westminster, tired and emotional after too many beers, shouting ‘Come on England’ and practicing a few of those expletives, just to prove what a regular, beer-drinking, swearing, footie watching bloke he is……
