-
And now it's back to the showjumping at
Hickstead..." What do you mean it's back to the showjumping at
Hickstead? I curse you and your horrific inbreeding; who cares about it?
Is a clear round from Belinda Arfbrother-Smythe really more important than
the Edinburgh Derby on the opening day of the Scottish football season?
Recently I've been asking myself these
kind of questions all too often. Radio 5 - the neutral sports fan's dream,
the Jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none of the sports media and the curse of
the re-located fan. But as a Hibs fan in London it is from scraps like
these that I must feed. Like a ravenous vulture I devour these unfilling
morsels - if I were a lion it would be like trying to feast on a
sparrow.
-
It
is Sunday the 30th of July and I've woken up with a sweaty brow; a
frenzied excitement has gripped me. Hibs are at Tynecastle and a
whole season of heroic failures and embarrassing defeats stretches out
before me. The anticipation is gloriously tangible: my taste-buds are
tingling with those Easter Road pies, my ears engulfed in
ritualistic chanting...Sauzee there's only one Sauzee...and
then...nothing. Its gone. I'm as deflated as a bike tyre on an
Edinburgh scheme.
-
This
season there will be no scouring of the 'Evening News' to follow the
progress of trialist Muchos Toilos, no Christmas calender signings at the
Leith Sanciro and what's more no day trips to Venice, well, Motherwell.
Instead, my life for the coming season will be contracted into just
one meaningful second a week, James Alexander-Gordon - its over to you. But
what if he falls ill, or he wakes up and says to himself "actually
Jimbo this job's quite crap" and decides to go and 'f'ind
himself' in Goa, or elope with Dez Lynam, What then? What if he bequeaths
his sacrosanct position to an incompetent fool or worse still a joker -
imagine the mess - "It's five O'clock, time for the
classified football results with Les Dennis" "Hibernian 4
Heart of middlleothian 0 (snigger, snigger) Ha Ha I had you
there etc etc -" Arse.
-
Perhaps I exaggerate. Perhaps it wont be Les Dennis just Michael Barrymore.
Perhaps even, Murdoch may save me (it sure as hell wont
be B.A.) The Sky revolution may mean the odd live game but even this
is a far from ideal solution. For a start I don't have Sattelite,
secondly London pub landlords are far more interested in the early rounds
of the county truck-pulling trials than they are in the Scottish Cup
Final and then, if at last my powers of persuasion do induce
the required change of channel, it is I who must defend the
decision to the easily riled, lumber-jack clad moustaches in the
corner. It's no fun.
-
Call me nostalgic, but there's no place like home.
by Ben Godsal
