The beautiful game
I went through life for nearly three decades having zero appreciation for the beautiful game. Then the 2002 World Cup came along. That year the co-host nations were Japan and South Korea. The personal breakthrough for me was the fact that the games were being played in a time zone that didn’t induce jetlag-like sleep deprivation. Finally, I was willing to partake of what my Football-mad husband considered compulsory viewing. I watched a lot of football that winter. Hours and hours and hours of it. Yes, I too became obsessed. I watched teams lay it all on the line, desperate to get out of the group stages. I also watched teams cynically poke the ball around to manufacture a draw because that’s all they needed to get out of the group stage. It’s a long tournament and fatigue is a factor. The discipline of conserving energy, the tactical approach required, fascinated me. What I remember most is time and time again wondering, how did they do that? How did they move the ball like that, maneuver their bodies like that? Also, how do they keep running that hard with that amount of discipline for such a long period of time? And, of course, the goals. The build up and then the incredible release and joy when someone actually scores.
After that year, the game had me in its grip. And I’ll admit to watching hours of not spectacular football. Local league games generally do not compare to the raw drama and geopolitical import of the World Cup.
The three things that tend to make me most disconsolate about now being blind are the fact I can’t read text, I can’t see artworks and I can’t see the details properly during the World Cup. There is also no doubt that the World Cup feels deeply wrong after all the corruption scandals and the fact that so many migrant workers lost their lives building the stadiums for the Qatar tournament in 2022. And let’s not forget FIFA’s decision to bestow a Peace Prize on Trump.
And yet, I still love the game. And I’ve found ways to watch it. This includes a game at Everton in the city of Liverpool. This was a common or garden English Premier League match in late 2019. Australia was being ravaged by bushfires and we were sitting in the freezing cold at Goodison Park. What made it extra-memorable was the fact that Everton provides free headsets to vision impaired fans so they can listen along and follow all the action. We were sitting among a group of locals who all knew each other and obviously sat in the same seats at each game, positioned behind and to the left of the goal. At one point, something consequential was happening down the other end of the ground. I told my husband courtesy of my nifty headset, ‘They’re saying the keeper might have handled the ball outside of the box’. For once, I was the one explaining what was going on. The anxious Everton fans sitting around me loved this novel source of information.
There’s a lot to feel scared about in our world right now. But picture me holding my iPad right up to my face watching SBS On Demand - and yes it’s still blurry even that close - and seeing Nestory Irankunda score his goal against Turkiye. The fact that they show the goals in slow motion from a close in angle helps – I can perceive the grace, strength and athletic skill involved. Helpfully, my husband is always willing to explain the build up to the goal, the angles and the teamplay.
With all the revolting anti-migrant and anti-refugee rhetoric at the moment, it was particularly sweet to watch Australia’s refugee striker slot the ball into the goals and hear the crowds lose their minds in ecstasy.
Football, even World Cup football, is like life. It can be tedious. It can be dramatic and heartbreaking. But it is truly glorious during moments like this. Moments that show what providing opportunity for migrants and refugees can do for a country’s soul and psyche.