LOSING MY RELIGION..

I never thought I would say this but after seven decades of enjoyment from football I find myself becoming more and more disillusioned with our so called national sport.   If anything, the events of the last few days have merely served to confirm it.

I think for me at least it goes back to the beginning of the Premier League, back in the early 90s, when what used to be a sport was transformed into little more than a money making business.   Fans suddenly became customers, invited to enjoy the matchday experience and revel in being identified with the brand in a results driven business.   Now, apart from the obvious bleats I had when Southampton suffered the humiliation of  relegations, administration, a succession of inept managers (including the fans favourite `Arry Redknapp) and some dubious chairmen, the standard of play may generally have improved over the years despite, rather than because of, the massive influx of foreign players into the Premier League.

My gripe, you see, is not about the game itself, it`s more about all the things that go on around it and it`s significant that not one of the bleats I trotted out above is anything to do with the game itself.  Most recently, we`ve had off the field nonsense surrounding Suarez, Tevez, Evra, whether to shake hands or not, John Terry, the Capello/Redknapp diversion and today we learn that Rangers are likely to go in administration, along with Portsmouth who  seem to be  frequent visitors to that course of action.

We`ve had the tiresome antics of the usual suspects - Ferguson, Pulis, Wenger et al - who have become caricatures of what football management should really be about - leadership, setting an example, dignity, restraint and, above all, honesty.   And with the staggering amounts of money involved the gap in perception between the `customers` and the businesses becomes ever wider - reminds me a bit of my relationship with energy companies.

Football at the self-styled `highest level` seems almost Hans Christian Andersen in its fairytale bubble or Alice in Wonderland in its removal from reality.   It has become a pantomime, a farce, an unedifying spectacle and I think I may well have had enough of it.   For more years than I care to remember I have, like Albert Camus, held the conviction that the one true religion might well be football.   After all, it was surely no coincidence that Matthew Le Tissier was known as Le God or that the forces of darkness were lurking in Old Trafford.


But now even I am  beginning to doubt whether my religion will be able to stand the prospect of the Saints  rejoining the ranks of the Premier League.  And I never thought I would ever admit to that either.   I must be getting old!