Saturday, 23 June 2012

Football Fodder

It's Euro Cup 2012 month... and that's all anyone is talking about. For 3 weeks, European nations battle it out for Football bragging rights for the next 4 years.

My international friends are all assembling at various pubs to watch their countries play one another and it has led to some heavy banter and constant speculating on what is going to happen next.

All of this football talk goes right over my head of course. At work it has replaced the weather for a safe and neutral subject to talk about in a corporate setting and my eyes glaze over when it comes up....

The BBC touched on this subject this week... I thought it was rather timely and appropriate as I was starting to wonder how much more I can fake interest when clients bring up last night's field goal.

In very British fashion, this piece addresses concern about how rude it might be to talk football in front of non-fans.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-18518186

How much football can you talk about to a non-fan?


Man showing a red card to a colleague

Millions of England fans are celebrating reaching the Euro 2012 quarter finals, with many wanting to talk about it. But at what point do football conversations become boring, or even rude to a non-fan?
Usually conversations about football are reserved for football fans. The less enthused tend to nod and smile, or subtly zone out, when football comes into bus stop banter or office water cooler chat.
But now England have reached the quarter finals of Euro 2012, football fever is sweeping the nation.
There are thousands of people suddenly engaging in debates about goals, free-kicks and possession.
A YouGov poll in May suggested 56% of the whole population are either "not at all interested" (37%) or "not very interested" (19%) in football.
So for those who can just about tolerate an office sweepstake, but have no interest in banal office football banter, at what point does talking about football become boring, or even rude?
Etiquette expert Simon Fanshawe, who is not a football fan, says he cannot stand the assumption football fans make about how much others understand, or even care, about the sport.

No comments:

Post a Comment