Coming Home? I never left.
Have you heard? Football’s coming home. Well, not to my home obviously, Germany exited the tournament two weeks ago. It’s a strange sensation working the day after your national team has beaten the national team of all the people you speak to that day. As an England fan it’s not something I’ve ever experienced, obviously. The whole thing is quite unreal, like having a window into a different reality. Watching shakily recorded videos of celebrations in central London on Wednesday night, it looked more like the intro to a new BBC drama than reality. The tournament has been a source of quite a few weird experiences over the last month, watching England make it to a final has only been one of them.
The most prominent weird thing is that we’re all watching a football tournament play out during a pandemic. Seeing stadiums slowly increasing capacity through the tournament, with an estimated 67,000 watching during the England v Denmark game, has been a source of debate in Germany and if I’m honest, a creeping sense of dread. Covid restrictions and stadium capacity discussions were included on Wednesday night’s pre-match show on ZDF (Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen). People at work have brought it up, asking about the current restrictions in place in England. It’s quite difficult to explain English covid restrictions because they appear to add up to the message ‘Do what makes you feel good’. I can’t make sense of them, I’m not sure anyone can, and there’s no way I’m going to try and explain the concept of “Freedom Day” to the Germans I know. They have bullshit radars as standard. Luckily for the British government, it doesn’t seem like anyone is planning to hold them to account, and even if they did they wouldn’t answer the question.
There’s still questions to be answered though, lots of them. Speaking to England fans who live in Germany, it seems we’ve all had to field some tough ones from friends and family here. Many questions have centred around the behaviour of England fans, from booing their own team at the beginning of the tournament to booing the national anthems of their opponents. I can’t speak for anyone else, but these are some of the most embarrassing conversations I’ve ever had during my time in Germany. That’s not the worst part though, I’ve found the most depressing reaction here to England fans booing is the shrug of acceptance that fans of England are just disrespectful.
What’s more galling is the fact that finally, after so many years of waiting, we actually have an England team to be proud of. Not only are they doing the job on the pitch, but they’re making waves off it. The united stance of the team over “Taking the knee”, and the beautiful vision expressed by Gareth Southgate’s ‘Dear England…’ letter are just two examples of many that make supporting this team so goddamn easy. They’re not just a young team of exciting players, they also offer an optimistic vision of what England can and should be. A team of open, throughly decent and respectful people who understand their position and are willing to use their platform and experiences to talk about larger topics than just football. It’s a team that deserves better than booing fans and denunciations by politicians. However much of this positivity is missed in discussions in Germany, with more focus being placed on the actions of the fans or the government’s Covid policy.
The larger weirdness of watching a tournament unfold with a pandemic backdrop has sparked smaller weird moments in my life. I’m sure I’m not alone in this. One totally new experience has been watching the whole thing at a complete disconnect. In previous tournaments, I’ve watched the majority of games in a crowd of people or sitting tightly packed on a beer garden bench. This time around I’ve been alone for games, if I’m lucky my wife will watch the first half and then excuse herself. I’ve always avoided watching football on my own, believing the football experience is better enjoyed in a crowd. What I discovered is I enjoy it, possibly even more than watching matches in a pub. At home I can rage at perceived injustices, safe in the knowledge that my expletive filled rants no longer require a hurried apology to all those within ear-shot.
In fairness there’s always some kind of disconnect, after all I’m watching my national team from a different country. I’ve often wondered what I would do if England ever reached the final of a major tournament, whether I would try and get tickets or at least travel back to England in order to watch the final unfold surrounded by a partisan crowd. Clearly I won’t be doing any of that this time around, but the craving to be surrounded by like minded fans did lead me to book a table in a beer garden for the quarter-final against the Ukraine and in turn to my weirdest experience of the whole tournament. It was surreal. After fifteen months away, sitting in a beer garden, surrounded by people. It was weird for the very fact it was so normal.
My evening in the beer garden was also odd on it’s own merits, regardless of the fact I hadn’t been out for months. The English people, even the smoothest among us, have the capacity to be cripplingly awkward, a trait that is often on display when several English people gather randomly to watch an international football tournament. Clumsy high-fives/fist-bumps abound as people who’ve never met form a temporary bond. It’s kind of beautiful in a way, but like most English gatherings, it tends to go sidewise around the sixth pint. Thankfully I watched with a couple of Germans, meaning I avoided the spilled drinks, the conversations about Brexit and the ever topical complaints about the minutiae of German life. However I did manage to keep up my end of the English awkward-fest by offending a German bloke by not accepting his chips when offered them. My excuse that, you know, there’s still a pandemic on and maybe eating each others food was a bad idea didn’t seem to convince. He didn’t seem any more convinced when he repeated my excuse several times to the people sat around us. Maybe my social skills are rusty, but I think I made the right move.
The last month has been a whirlwind and on Sunday I’ll finally get to witness England playing in a major final. I honestly still can’t believe it. All I can hope is that England fans rise to the occasion, but I’m not hopeful. Whatever the score, come Monday I’m sure I’ll be answering questions from bemused Germans. Before that though, I have one more weekend of surreal experiences ahead of me. Here’s hoping that England win the final, if only to cap one of the oddest months of my life with the ultimate act of weirdness.
Image Credit
Photo by Jaanus Jagomägi on Unsplash
Photo by Jack Monach on Unsplash
Photo by Michael Cummins on Unsplash
Photo by Ryan Stone on Unsplash
