right then, debate time
been a while since we had a good old debate... You are not wrong about anything you say Paul, just that by saying it I feel you are only seeing one side of the footie argument and by doing so are contributing to it being a divide.
You are right about the less than savoury elements in footie, - I made the mistake of taking my youngster for a walk across the park to stop and watch at a Sunday league game, - ok bad language exists and you are not going to hide it from your children these days, - but the hatred and aggression aimed at the ref was a disgrace. In a game of Rugby you call the ref Sir, - he who is to be obeyed. However the social and class divide within footie will not get any better if those that are not part of it keep knocking it without imo fully understanding it.
Footie is a game that nearly everybody can play, - as I said above even without a ball, - it is a universal game (and as an aside something we can do better than the USA, for a short while longer). The story of the WW1 no mans land games on Christmas day? It really is just a bit of fun that should not have barriers within it, and by knocking it all the time and not seeing the good within it is only building those barriers higher (sorry repeating myself).
My comments on the cycling drug abuse are from direct experience within the sport. I don't knock the sport for the sake of it, - Le Tour de France is the greatest sporting event of the world. A few years ago I managed a Mountain Bike race team and a couple of my riders were GB juniors within road racing who would come back here to the UK for the winter and muck around on MTB's. They would ride through the summer getting those miles into their legs based out of Belgium, - and they would win live chickens for sprints!! But they both gave up road racing as they were expected to take stuff where the manager would not tell then what was in it, - when they questioned it they were told if you want to ride for me, you do what I tell you to do. They were expected to put butterflies into their biceps under the jersey sleeve and connect it to what was handed to them out of the team car in the last 10km. This was not isolated to this team, - another guy I knew in those days rode for Carrera as a Chiapucci lieutenant, - as he would say, you may stop taking the stuff when you get to the top but along the way you have not a clue what you have been given.
I think it the sad state of all sports that drugs are involved in nearly everything, and yes I do believe that cycling has been for many many years one of the worst abusers of them all, - even the blood doping of the Russian Olympic team going back many years. Blood doping is where you take a pint of blood out, let you body regenerate its replacement and then put the pint back in that you first took out. Why do many cyclists die when they get into their retirement?
Football is far from perfect but it is all too easy to knock it without acknowledging what a great game it is for millions of people around the world, - I gave up playing when I was about 13 and played Rugby for school instead, in truth I can take it or leave it, but as a dad of a 5 year old I recently had to think about my sons request to join in with his mates at school and do some football training with Chelsea as part of their "Football in the community". Do I say no, I would rather you mix with the "better" kids and learn to play rugby, or do I let him see part of the real world, learn bad language, how to spit etc. I chose to let him play his football; I hope that parental guidance will teach him that the poor behaviour of some is not to be followed. I also think that as a sport for a 5 year old footie can't be beaten for teaching team involvement, balance, hand (foot) eye coordination etc. And his mother being Brasilian it kind of limits his acceptance into Brasilian culture with his cousins if he can't play the game.