Football is passing my children by - I can see why, says Leicester City fan Gary Silke
The Fox fanzine editor and Mercury columnist Gary Silke is, it’s fair to say, a huge Leicester City fan. He had hoped his children would share his passion. But kids tend to go their own way, don’t they?
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City fan Gary Silke, with his children, George, 10 and Liberty, six
When my son George was born, in June 2000, I resisted the urge to jog the few hundred yards from the Leicester Royal Infirmary maternity unit to Filbert Street and register him as a Junior Fox.
I didn't dress him in a "City Til I Die" baby-gro either, or sneak in an LCFC-related middle name like Keith, or Filbert.
Long before his launch date, I had resolved that I wouldn't foist my obsession with football and Leicester City on him in any way.
My one indulgence was to take him down to Filbert Street during the closing-down auction in 2002 and make sure he toddled a football between the posts and into the net at the Kop end.
If he chose football, then that would be all well and good, as long as he didn't support Manchester United, in which case he would be put up for adoption. Hey, I'm joking... I think.
The result of me not force-feeding him on a football diet has been... well, you might expect me to say a genuine love of the game, but I'd be lying.
He has a contempt for the sport that is almost admirable, won't play it, won't watch it and thinks it is a complete waste of time.
He's not a PlayStation potato – he builds dens, climbs trees and is a keen cricketer, but football leaves him stone cold.
His heroes are Doctor Who and Luke Skywalker, not Matty Fryatt and Jack Hobbs, and when it comes down to it, I can't make a heartfelt plea on behalf of the modern game, because with the passing years I have developed a contempt for it too.
Everything good about the game I fell in love with in the mid-70s has either gone or been devalued.
The FA Cup Final was more exciting than Christmas and your birthday rolled into one.
As a 10-year-old, I would camp in front of the TV from mid-morning with cans of drink, sweets and crisps to plough through, the cup final editions of the Radio Times and Shoot! close to hand, aching for three o'clock to come round.
My son would regard having to watch 10 minutes of the FA Cup Final as a cruel and unusual punishment, and even I have to admit that the old showpiece has lost its sparkle.
The Champions League, which replaced the perfect European Cup competition, is purely about finance and I refuse to watch any of it.
The marvellous European Cup Winners Cup has gone and the UEFA Cup is now a Europa League fixture slog.
The Premier League has managed to ruin both domestic football and the England national side.
When discussing a team's promotion, it is now compulsory to mention how much their elevation is worth in financial terms. Whatever happened to glory?
The England v Scotland fixture, once the linchpin of British football and one of half a dozen live televised games all season, has been abandoned.
Many footballers appear to have gone feral, attacking, sexually assaulting and running over members of the general public on a regular basis.
In the hours leading up to my daughter Liberty's birth in May 2004, I nipped out for a tension-relieving walk and bought a paper on Narborough Road.
The front page of a national paper carried the news that four Leicester City players had been cleared of assaulting two women in La Manga.
But all the same, I wouldn't be pushing my second child towards the game. Or buying her a "Trainee WAG" T-shirt.
She can kick a ball straight, but would rather dance round the room while watching High School Musical 3, given a choice.
Surprisingly, George has actually made his Walkers Stadium debut.
His mates were going, so he came along to watch a lousy 3-1 defeat at home to Queens Park Rangers in 2007.
With my treasured old City scarf round his neck he feigned interest for 10 minutes, sat bored for an hour, and then played tig in the empty seats at the back. When I asked what had been the best thing about the day, he replied: "The big slide". (We had given the kids 10 minutes in Bede Park on the way to the game).
Come to think of it, he was right.
I couldn't help but contrast his match-going debut with my own.
I had been thrilled to the core as I entered Filbert Street for the first time and was enthralled by a 0-0 draw with Ipswich.
In retrospect it was a pretty dull game, but I was jaw-droppingly entranced by seeing gods like Keith Weller, Frank Worthington and Dennis Rofe in the flesh, rather than on football stickers and Star Soccer.
And the noise of the singing from the Spion Kop, brooding in the dark under the Double Decker, was thrilling.
Standing on the terraces in a uniquely edgy atmosphere has been replaced by sitting in rows of seats in a subdued and tamed silence.
Overpriced nylon shirts have replaced the classic cotton designs and the Tannoy-fed "matchday experience" noisily blares over pre-match songs and drowns out any conversation.
There is almost no aspect of the game that doesn't annoy me, and I sometimes think that the love of the game I acquired as a kid is so deeply ingrained that it is the only thing keeping me there.
Football is not the all-consuming hobby and pastime for kids that it was for much of the previous century.
There are plenty of other things to do, that are just as exciting and rewarding.
If I'd somehow had anachronistic access to Star War Rogue Squadron III for the Gamecube in 1977, would I still have been content to spend hours putting stickers in Panini albums and reading Roy of the Rovers? Possibly not.
Am I disappointed that my kids don't hero worship the likes of John Terry or Ashley Cole? Absolutely not.
They're not exactly Bobby Moore, are they?
And there's the thing. I suppose what I really wanted to do was take my son down to Filbert Street to see Keith Weller, but Keith died and Filbert Street is now student flats.
The game I loved no longer exists, but my kids have shown me there is more to life. And Matt Smith is a great new Doctor Who.
Singing the blues: Read Gary Silke's column on old Leicester City chants in the September edition of the Leicestershire Chronicle. It's out now, priced 65p.
11 Comments
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by Tony Adamson, Redcar in Cleveland
Monday, September 06 2010, 8:08PM
“Well said Gary.Having just read your article which was kindly forwarded to me by my brother Billy now living down south, i have to say that i could not agree with you more. I am guessing from your article that you are of a similar age to me and fell in love with your team as i did in the early 70s. I would consider it fair to say both Leicester City and my team Middlesbrough are about equals in terms of our histories,the grounds we played in then and now and the sort of crowds that have watched our teams since the 70s.Over the last decade i have obsearved the same things you have written about.I have sat week after week watching my beloved Boro trying convince myself that football will get better and get back to the sport it once was.I trudged out of The Walkers Stadium at the end of last season vowing that i had watched my last game.After around 40 years i had, had enough.The working mans sport was finished.The crack with the lads before and after the game has been missing for years.New stadiums and over paid, over raited footballers have sickened me off. As one of our local legends Chris Rea once sang . . Its all gone. Although he is refering to his home town in the song and the fact that his father advised him not to return because the old Middlesbrough that he grew up in and loved was finished and had all but vanished.The words are true and Boro FC have been caught up in the changes because the lads that went to the games, the people who created the atmosphere at Ayresome Park no longer go because they became sick of all the changes and the greed in the modern game.Whilst i do not mean any dissrespect to the modern day fans, they arn,t the same as the ones that used to fill our stadiums and follow our teams up and down the country.Its a shame they will never get to sample a taste of how it was back in the old days.I know i sound like an old man but i supose you have to be oldish to understand what i mean.
Crazy as it sounds, i have renewed my ticket AGAIN this season.Yes i was there again at The Walkers Stadium for our first away game and no it was,nt much better than our last meeting.Sure we will have our ups and downs again but we will never see the good old days again.Having watched the early games of this season i have to say its like Groundhog Day all over again and i am already bored and wish i had,nt bothered with the season ticket.Its not just the crap we are being searved at Boro but the P... Poor world cup we watched and the foreign multi billionaire club owners polishing their toys.
I will never give up completly on the game or my team but i think i know deep down my time is up.I will become a part timer and take in the odd game. The modern game ? You can keep it.Sad to say it but its true . . . Its all gone.
Glad i,ve got that off my chest.Come on Boro.
Tony.A Redcar.”
by Johnny P, New Mills, High Peak
Sunday, September 05 2010, 9:36AM
“I could not agree more with Gary Silke's article. There are many differing reasons that I no longer follow Leicester City / football in the way that I once did, but the overriding reason has to be that the life is being insidiously & progressively sucked out of the game. Greed and moral corruption seem to be very normal, acceptable (almost laudable) traits in our society, and they consume whatever they find in their path...........it seems to me that football is being chewed up & spat out by the few.”
by Adrian, Sileby
Saturday, September 04 2010, 10:32AM
“A wonderful piece of nostalgia Gary, I too have become so cynical of the way that money, the marketing men and the whole health & safety & corporate driven matchday experience has just ruined the game. I too remember seeing those gods in my first trips to filbert street in the mid 70's and yes Kulgan or Ian Woolnough whoever you are, I hero worshipped Keith Weller & Lenny Glover & Frank Worthington & the Birch because at 8 years old the idea of hero worshipping a member of the armed forces, emergency services etc etc however brave & dedicated they maybe doesnt really come into the equation”
by Keith, Leicester
Friday, September 03 2010, 5:41PM
“Always enjoy your musings Gary and this one hit home more than they usually do. You are absolutely right. My Dad told me the long haired prima donnas of the seventies weren't worth watching so are we turning into our Dads? Just take comfort that you did see Keith play at Filbert Street when we had an atmosphere. I do.”
by When You're Smiling, Leicester
Friday, September 03 2010, 5:38PM
“Always enjoy your column Gary and this one hits home with me more than usual. Just be consoled by the fact that you saw Keith in action. I am.”
by Kulgan, Crydee
Friday, September 03 2010, 5:30PM
“John of Leicester,
If you read the URL of this story you will note that it is actually in the News section of the site.
My comments may be futile in your opinion but they were on the comment by Gary Silke about his children not worshipping football as heroes. Fortunately he does say he is not disappointed with that fact.
Footballers are not heroes. I don't say this because football does not interest me but because footballers are only doing their job. A job that they get well paid for. Some do it better than others but that happens in all walks of life.
A hero is a young 18 soldier fighting on the frontline in Afghanistan because his political masters have ordered the forces to do this when others are arguing over people singing at the football stadium.
A hero is someone in the Emergency Services who save others, clear up the mess of car accidents, stand up to someone about to stab another, keeps on trying to revive a casualty.
A hero is a cancer victim raising money for others and there are many more examples.
A footballer, however good they are, are just doing a job.”
by John, Leicester
Friday, September 03 2010, 4:42PM
“Kulgan, Crydee I thought you said you don't like football. If that is the case what are you doing on hear. you comments are Futile.”
by Billy Napier, Leicester
Friday, September 03 2010, 4:23PM
“Gary, shame on you. What ever happened to good old fashioned indoctrination? Let's build a time machine (oh yeah, The Tardis) and go back to 1973, or thereabouts. You'd be onto a winner then. Weller to Glover to Worthington...there you go son, all's well with the world.”
by john, hong kong
Friday, September 03 2010, 1:18PM
“I also agree totally. Having been a fan for 30 years it seems to have changed since the vast amounts of money became involved in the game. No integrity in the game anymore. Pity.”
by Kulgan, Crydee
Friday, September 03 2010, 11:27AM
“Hero worship footballers.... Come on, really.”