Sunday, May 4, 2014

A Scottish football fan's Australian diary

Friday 18 April
I got extremely agitated on the flight to Dubai after realizing that it didn't have WiFi - my hopes of using SkyGo to watch Inverness-Aberdeen went down the tubes.  Instead I had to watch the Alan Partridge movie, which contains the same amount of slapstick and farce in an hour and a half as the average Scottish league game.

I got even more agitated at Dubai airport when I couldn't connect to their free WiFi to check the score.

Finally, on the Dubai-Sydney connection, we got WiFi, but the wife only went and nicked the iPad to look at photos of our wedding on Facebook!  I couldn't believe it.  She hasn't got her priorities right at all!

At last, at about 3am BST, I found out the score.  It was a nil-nil draw.  Just for a moment, I felt like a bit of a pillock.


Saturday 19 April
Got to the hotel late on Saturday night.  There was a quick chance to check the scores before bed.  It's a nine hour time difference and it was only just after midnight, but Hibs are already two down.  This amuses me.


Sunday 20 April
Unbelievable - I've only been on the other side of the world for five minutes and I've already missed Jamie Hamill poleaxing Derek Adams.  However, I've finally found something that the SPFL is good for - its Youtube channel, which allowed me to see the highlights of yesterday's games.  This doesn't exactly make up for the (approximately) 3,276,523 ways in which the SPFL has ruined Scottish football so far, but I suppose it's a start.

I showed the wife the footage of the Hamill-Adams incident.  She told me she wasn't impressed.  I was about to tell her she was absolutely right, that it was a scandal and that the book should be thrown at Hamill...but then I realized that the wife was probably talking about me.


Monday 21 April
Did the Harbour Bridge Climb today. My ears pricked up when the instructor starting talking to another tourist about how much he loved "the footie". I was gutted to have missed out on the chat...till I got back to the hotel and checked the guide book. Here, apparently "the footie" is Rugby League. I mean, what the hell? They barely even kick the ball in Rugby League.  The guidebook refers to Rugby League, Rugby Union, Tennis, Aussie Rules and about a million other sports - but it doesn't mention football.  I need to get back to civilization sharpish.


Tuesday 22 April
This cafe we visited in Sydney appears to have stolen Jamie Hamill's likeness for its logo.  He should probably sue.

  


Wednesday 23 April
The wife has begun to notice that I'm suffering from withdrawal symptoms - it's the shakes that give it away - and offers to let me go to an A-League game.  However, even I know that taking your wife to watch the A-League on honeymoon could be used as grounds for an annulment later on.  Besides, the Aussies watch their soccer in the same way we watch it back home - eschew the mediocre domestic stuff in favour of watching far superior English Premier League games on the telly.  They're a clever bunch..


Thursday 24 April
Tour of the Blue Mountains today.  I met a Taiwanese chap who, on discovering I'm from Scotland, immediately exclaimed "MOYES!!!".  So now, whenever anyone on the other side of the world meets a Scot, they automatically think of David Moyes.  That's depressing.


Friday 25 April
News reaches me of the Rangers 120-day review.  These are the only people in Rangers tops I've seen so far in Sydney.

Which is odd, because I thought they were supposed to have 100 million fans worldwide, so you'd think there'd be a few here.  I suppose they might just not be wearing their tops.


Saturday 26 April
I saw a clip of Australian Rules Football on the TV today.  As far as I can tell, it involves about 30 huge men having a punch up in a field, with a ball in the general vicinity.  I think Jim Goodwin has missed his calling in life.


Sunday 27 April
The wife can't stand my withdrawal symptoms any longer and lets me watch Sunderland-Cardiff before bed, bringing me back from the brink.  Before bed, I check the scores from back home.  Hibs are already two down.  This amuses me.

 
Monday 28 April
I wake up to read that John Hughes has been firing his Cliché Cannon again...which is never a good sign.  This may be karma for making the wife sit through a game last night.

Apparently ICT "need to learn" from a 6-0 drubbing at Celtic Park - which I'm pretty sure is what he said after we lost 5-0 at Celtic Park a couple of months ago.  I consider whether I should stay in Australia until Hughes leaves Inverness.  The wife is quite happy with this prospect.


Tuesday 29 April
We're now in Melbourne, and today the rain was practically biblical.  We're toured the Great Ocean Road today, where everything was sodden and muddy.  I blame John Hughes for this.  Mind you, he would probably insist these were the perfect conditions for getting your centre-backs to pass out of defence.  I had a stomach upset and felt horrendously ill all day.  I blame John Hughes for this as well, though my wife's suggestion that I've been eating and drinking too much crap may also have some merit, I suppose.


Wednesday 30 April
Here in Melbourne, 'footie' is Aussie Rules Football.  This does at least seem to involve kicking the ball a little bit more than Rugby League does, but still...
The family we're staying with are huge Aussie Rules fans.  I asked about attendances at these games.  The reply?  "well, for a game between smaller teams, there'd only be about twenty thousand".  Strewth.  I wish Scottish football could attract twenty thousand to a game between smaller teams.


Thursday 1 May
We walked around Melbourne today.  From the Eureka Skydeck, we could see panoramic views of the entire city.  There are about a million huge sports stadia within walking distance.  This might be the greatest city in the world ever.  However, we are here for about the only four-day period in the history of mankind when there is not a sporting event taking place in Melbourne.  Hell, I'd have even gone to an A-League game if it meant getting inside one of those grounds.


Friday 2 May
Home today.  The way the flights work out, we won't get back till Inverness till 4pm Saturday, which means I'll miss the home game against Dundee United.  Strangely, I'm not in the slightest bit disappointed about this...

L.

1 comment:

Cal said...

Honeymoon in Australia?! I hope the marriage isn't as gruelling as the trip must have been....

Incidentally, Aussie Rules is probably one of the few sports (along with baseball and rugby league) that I'd put up there with football in terms of their significance, community meaning, and historical continuity. It was actually codified and organised earlier than football or rugby were here, and so could be considered the original form of organised football. If you've read Goldblatt's The Ball is Round (and if you haven't, go steal a copy now) then you may remember he talks a little about Aussie Rules, and how its early popularity froze out soccer in Australia, much as baseball did in the US. Probably why these sports seem to me to share a similar culture and history in some respects to British football.

Anyway, welcome home. I've been watching SPFl on Youtube all season (in the US), and its been a lifesaver. Not sure why watching a cold, foggy Victoria Park with darkness creeping in at halftime should make one homesick, but it does.