Andrew

Bit scary, and a tad unfair, to be drawing comparisons between rugby and
English soccer support. I spent eight years living in England, and my
experience of soccer support has turned me off the gamme itself, and I'll
certainly never darken the turnstile of the pro game.

On the other hand, I've been supporting rugby all my life, starting in
Limerick, and it bears no resemblance to the ill-informed, ill-mannered and
downright malevolent atmosphere I have experienced in the cities and pubs of
England when there is a soccer match in town.

Nowhere is the passion for its team more pronounced than in the Munster
support at Thomond Park - yet, on the odd occasion that I have heardf a
Munster supporter hassle a visitor, it has invariably been his (and I use
that word advisedly) own, fellow supporters who have immedoiately silenced
him.

Long may it last, I say.

Steve McNamara
----- Original Message -----
From: "Andrew Deacon" <deacon@...>
To: <irishrugby@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Friday, May 02, 2003 1:58 PM
Subject: [irishrugby] supporters


> I didn't mean to be dismissive of anybody who wants to support Ireland or
any of the provinces passionately. I do think, though, that the definition
of supporter can become, if we're not careful, rigid to the point of
intolerance.
> I attended a couple of Bundesliga matches a few years ago and commented to
a German friend about the lack of atmosphere relative to English soccer
grounds. Sure, he replied, but he felt perfectly safe in bringing his kids
to a game in Germany, where the ground was clean and safe. The 'atmosphere'
in English grounds, he felt, was dictated entirely by males between the ages
of fifteen and thirty-five, and the dark side of their passionate support
was the foul-mouthedness, racism, general air of aggression that excluded
everyone who belonged to the tribe.
> I'm not saying the average Irish rugby fan fits that profile, but I
wouldn't mind betting that most contributors to this discussion fit the age
and gender parts at least. Behind the appeals for more vocal support and the
deploring of suits and midriffs is a kind of nostalgia for the days when
supporting representative rugby meant big groups of lads having a few pints
and roaring their heads off. Those days are gone.
> I'm a liberal and I'd like everyone to be allowed to support his/her team,
without rules. I'd make the exception that nobody should interfere with
anyone else's enjoyment. One or two long days at cricket tests sitting near
some plonker dressed as a nun, who's bladdered at 11 o'clock in the morning
and never looks at the match, have taught me that the first rule of
spectatorship is: the playrs are the show, the supporters are there to
watch.
> AD
>
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