Champions of Europe again
Photo: Wikipedia
This week, I was thinking “what has recently happened in sports that we could write about?”. Now, unless you live in a sound proof area of London (highly likely that even that wouldn’t work), the main sporting event that has recently happened was the Champions League Final, where on Friday night, from 10pm till God knows what time in the morning, you could hear the cheering and the shouting, alongside the many cars honking and the scarily many ambulances and police cars as Chelsea beat Man City 1-0. Now I live quite close to Fulham Broadway, where not too far away, is the Chelsea stadium, which means… I heard it all! However, I did realise that an article on the game would not be very helpful because either you are a massive Chelsea fan and watched every second of the game (and therefore, no matter what kind of recap I write, it wouldn’t do it justice in your eyes), are a Man City fan and do not want a recap (and anything I write would be completely unfair in your eyes), or you support other teams / really don’t like watching football, and therefore don’t care about a recap. So, I thought I could write about what people might be interested in, which is a sports games’ atmosphere. This does sound a bit vague and may not catch your attention, but do hear me out!
You’re walking down any London street and you hear cheering. Cars around you are honking with flags up and every possible merchandise you can think of. People around you are all dressed in a jerseys, some definitely drunk and legless at 9 o’clock in the morning, singing songs and chanting. You hear the radio stations talking about the game, and all the pubs already have posters up on drink specials for the games. Somewhere, there is music playing and people around you are dancing and singing (not always in tune), but you can tell they are having a good time. And for the first time in a while, you notice the people of London are united and happy and cheering together, and is no longer that independent, fast-paced, high-stress environment that it has been for the rest of the year. Everyone wants to be your friend; people are smiling at you, asking you who you’re supporting or if you’re watching the game, and when celebrations come around, they drag you in to dance, they cheer with you, and they make you happy. At this point, I think you all might have a sport, or a specific game in mind, but in the end, it doesn’t matter what event is going on, that is the beauty of sport. It unites people in a way that is almost unexplainable – if the team wins, everyone celebrates as they all won together, and if the team loses, everyone mourns together. Now, of course, not everyone has the luxury or the will to celebrate a win till the crack of dawn and therefore this kind of celebration can also be your worst nightmare, and I know it wasn’t fun hearing it when I had to wake up early in the morning. But I did know that when I thought about it, even when I was scared to no end at the sound of shouting, I couldn’t help but smile and be happy for the love of the game, the experience, and the community it provided for those few short hours.
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