Nott What You'd Expected...

Hit the Pitch and Back the Reds

Last night was unexpectedly chill yet eye-opening. Despite the fact that we were in a very posh hotel-bar/pub/music club surrounded by 50 year olds in black turtlenecks and blazers listening to a 'gypsy jazz combo' containing a standup bass, electric guitar and some wierd acoustical electric, we (Ryan Aaron and I) were exposed to the glory that is Nottingham Forest Football for the first time.
Here's a clip for the musically inclined: not sure on the sound quality, but you get the jist....


The atmosphere, as mentioned, was nice- very relaxed, very intellectual really, but the intensity lay in the discussion of Forest past and present, the ins and outs of the Premiership, the joy of Selection days, Match of the Day on BBC, the FA cup concluding in May, and donning (or refusing to wear) the Forest Red with 20 thousand of your closest brethren.....

The setup of football in the Premiership and below is thus: There are four essential leagues, the Premiership, the Champions League, CocaCola League 1 and Coke league 2. The # of teams stays constant, 20,20,24,24, but the actual teams in each league is dependant on the last year's performace.... Essentially, the three worst teams in the Premiership are replaced with the three best teams from the next league, and so on throughout the leagues. Because of this, good teams are in the top, bad teams in the bottom, and the balance is pretty even (aside from billionares coming in and buying the best players- there is no salary cap or revenue sharing, no drafts, etc)...

Back in the 1970's, Forest were the best in the world.... literally, the best football team ever. They are one of three teams to repeat as EuroChamps, and at one point reigned supreme over the Premiership year after year... Just as easily as it is to fall from greatness (Forest are also the only team to have won the Euro and now play in a 3rd division), it is just as possible to rise to the top. In Football, the teams are divided all the way down to small almost 'pick up' teams, with stories of once small teams (ex. Wimbledon a while back) that have played teams like Man U. in the FA cup... David Juggins compared the occurance of Wimbledon and Man U as "A group of you guys in Decorah rising to the opportunity to play the Yankees in the World Series"... it's amazing really to think how well supported and embedded in the culture Football is...

Teams like Forest are well supported, and do quite well for the size of the town. Supporters usually wear jerseys (unless they are supersticious), and yell and scream at the top of their lungs... "Firms" or "hooligans" as they may sometimes be called, are groups of football supporters who are acutally more interested in fighting than actually watching the game. Green Street Hooligans, a movie with Elijah Wood, does a fairly accurate portrayal of pub life, Firms, and football in England... The way to tell a member of a firm? Most won't wear the jersey- they're not interested in the game, just the fight that will occur outside of the stadium. Other tipoffs? Burberry clothes, tracksuits, baseball hats, etc.... pretty much "chav" gear (look up chav on wikipedia for a better definition)....
So, according to the Juggins', football matches are way more safe than many Americans think... the odds of getting into a fight as long as you're in a jersey are very unlikely.

Which brings me to my pumped-up point of the day: we're going to a match on saturday, against Bristol, the number 2 team in the league to Forest's 1... they're separated by 2 pts in the standings, and with Forest's loss last night, it's even closer now.... Jersey purchases on Monday, game on Saturday.. should be a good time

Oh, and John- the team we'll be seeing? Millwall... the Southern London Ghetto rep of the league, a team more interested in fighting than the game. None of their fans wear jereseys, and they were seen in G Street Hooligans as the team that attacks West Ham's firm and kills (oops) Pete... their chant : something to the effect of "No one likes us, We don't care...."
so get ready for a good time....

enough football talk for now, with all of the cricket and rugby going on over here in the next few months(The Ashes pits England v. Australia, and the English play New Zealand in rugby next week), i have some wikipedia research to do....

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in a side note, we attended/sang at our home church today (the one connected to the flat), and our 8 flatmates outnumbered the congregation 2 to 1... that's right, we sang in front of 4 people.... The pastor studied at OSU in OK at one point, and had some pretty interesting things to say...
"I'm not saying I'm against violence... i'm all for it"
"The Bible is like a machine gun" (more or less)
...not to mention calling out one of the congregation as someone who places a bible on the coffee table only when she knows he's coming to dinner....
and they wonder why there are only 4 people in the church....

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time to study, big day tomorrow....(?)

eh.
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Oh, this is funny, too--- here, although KFC does exist, there are also QFC's, and AFC (American Fried Chicken).... i'm not sure if it's a novelty or just blatent copywrite infringment....

posted by Kevin @ 3:06 PM