The Olympics have been on the radio and TV channels for almost two weeks now. I have watched more than my fairshare of minority sports and spent nearly all last weekend sat glued to the track and field events. I do sort of feel the “buzz” and slightly regret not making more of an effort last year to get tickets to attend the games.
All this success, and humility and graciousness of our winners and losers has led me to the conclusion that the nation ‘s favourite spectator and participation sport – football- has reached a crossroads with this Olympics. Sturridges bad tempered exit after missing a penalty in thequarter finals simply highlighted it.
The country that gave the world football and has the most successful league in the world couldn’t even get a team together that could beat South Korea( even with its emerging football presence on the worlds stage and handful of Premiership players it is still a footballing minnow compared to us). This can’t be right. Why can't we perform on the big stage when it comes to football? Why do our players behave so badly compared to other sportsmen?
I can’t say that I love handball, synchronised swimming, archery, beach volleyball or even track and field events anymore than I did before the Olympics. But I think I love football a bit less.
Having said that I have already booked my first Tuesday night trip to Peterborough so probably I will forgive football yet again. But the thought of another season of bad tempered matches with high levels of disrespect towards the officials doesn’t give me a "buzz" .Especially after watching so little dissent and acceptance on the part of the athletes that sometimes other competitors are simply just better than you.
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