I’ve never seen so many grown men weep. This tournament has been an unseemly orgy of wailing and tears as both fans and players responded with bucketfuls of the stuff as their teams got knocked out one by one, until only those who would be kings are crowned on Sunday.
I’ve not been immune. Warm and salty tears spontaneously and surprisingly sprang out of my eyes last Friday night when the final whistle blew in the Ghana vs Uruguay game. This was followed by an embarrassing and rather unladylike groan of agony.
Mercifully, I’d heeded the advice of a mate who’d advised that this was not the match to be watched in the company of others. Yes. Me. A girl, shattered over a football match. Africa was out of the World Cup. Our last hope, the gleaming Black Stars, had been cheekily tossed out.
I wept because of the searing pain it caused me, the dent to our pride and also because it all seemed so unfair. I also wept because I hated myself for daring to buy into the hype of this sport. As a proud South African and African I’d fully expected to buy into the excitement, the sense of expectation and goodwill generated by hosting the event. And by all accounts it has been a successful tournament. My enthusiasm was driven by support for the national side, soaking up the atmosphere, the people watching, taking in the parties and having a really good time.
However, I’d never meant actually to get caught up in the football action itself because I’ve never understood the finer nuances or technicalities of the 90-minute, 11-a-side game.
I’ve always viewed the game as something that men were passionate about — and their fanaticism was not to be questioned or interfered with. Got that. Our role as women has always been to watch quietly and never to ask silly things like, “What does offside mean?” It might be pivotal to our understanding of the game, but such questions are considered annoying. I’d figured out some basics and knew when to cheer, clap, whistle, jeer and when not to. That had always been the extent of my involvement, until the 2010 World Cup descended on us.
Somehow I got seduced and started following the games, the scores, the style of play, the pace, and not just the peripheral aspects that had always interested me, like the politics and who the hotties were.
(To digress: Diego Forlán has got to be the sexiest player of this World Cup what with those steely, piercing blue eyes, although I know it is not politically correct to say this, given the humiliation his razor-sharp boot has visited on Africans, not once but twice, in this tournament.)
Once I was reeled in, I found myself screaming at players and refs. At Ellis Park in a clash between Brazil and Chile, my voice could be counted among those yelling “Kaka!” from the bleachers. I had become a fully engrossed observer.
What had happened to me? The football bogey had taken over my heart. I was in the bliss and high of a new love affair, deeply emotionally invested, but naively oblivious of the possibilities of heartache, disappointment and loss that could come with such a fling.
So when these three bedfellows of love did visit me — when Uruguay annihilated South Africa at Loftus — I was shattered, wounded, inconsolable. Restless and unable to sleep after that devastating three-nil loss, I implored male friends for answers.
Why didn’t any of you warn me, that it hurts so much? I asked. One astute response was: “Now you know why we come home late, drunk, incoherent and inconsolable when our teams lose.”
Bitter and disappointed after that game, I began wondering what it is that football can teach us about love and loss? I suppose the first thing is you can never really anticipate or fully comprehend the depth of the emotion itself once you are in it. It can only be love and commitment that brought thousands of people to fill the stadiums in what surely has to have been one of the chilliest winters in South Africa.
Explaining the appeal of the game in a June issue of Time magazine and why the World Cup has become “the [human] species’ favourite pastime”, renowned sports writer and author John Carlin describes football as being the great “equaliser” because it is accessible and democratic. Anyone can do it and anyone can be great at it. It is a game that can be played anywhere and the basic rules are simple. The great equaliser that is so much like love — in that it doesn’t matter who you are and where you are from and whether you are rich or poor, pretty or ugly — it is in football that you can find love and be loved.
The second lesson is this: dented and bruised by Bafana’s exit from the World Cup, I resolutely vowed to take up knitting and ignore the entire football spectacle because I simply couldn’t bare to be hurt again.
Once again the wisdom of a hardened football enthusiast swayed me from my folly. He explained that that was part of the thrill — for me fully to appreciate and understand the game, I couldn’t wear protective emotional armour just because there was the possibility or risk of heartbreak and disappointment. I would miss out on the richness of the experience if I did that.
He was right. I might have been inconsolable after Ghana’s defeat but I would have felt empty had I not dared to believe again.