A Fellow Tidbitter’s FA Cup Fixation

Different people like different things. Just about everyone likes food, and we don’t make a secret of that around here, but we’re not much into sports ordinarily. We take a casual interest, but generally I wouldn’t say that competition in any form plays a significant part in our day-to-day lives.

I met this British guy the other day who was just about as different from that as you could imagine. All, he seemed to want to talk about, was a football this and soccer that… The guy was nuts for it.

In particular he was trying to sell me on something called the FA Cup which – he informed me in no uncertain terms – is a soccer competition in the UK which takes place around the winter and spring. My English friend was positively evangelical on the subject and he made me promise to go and check it out for myself. And true to my word, here I am, finding out about the Football Association Cup – founded in 1871 and won in that year by a team called Wanderers only. They beat an army side called the Royal Engineers by the dramatic scoreline of one to zero.

As far as I can tell, neither of those teams exist anymore. Now it’s won by teams from the English Premier League but who still have names that sound like they come from the same Victorian era: Aston Villa, Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur. You don’t tend to get names like that bandied around in this part of the world.

My English friend was even more excited when he got onto the subject of football betting ‘all part of the fun’ as he insisted on putting it. Now don’t get me wrong, it’s not for me to judge someone else’s culture any more than it is for me to tell them what to do with their money, but I didn’t quite buy into what he was trying to tell me on this.

I mean, if you’re a sports fan, you’re a sports fan, right? Having a bet on the action is something different. Well that’s what I thought, but my English pal – I’d met him at a truck stop and we got chatting over a cup of coffee – was adamant that going to the game, ‘having a pint’ and enjoying a bet were all part of the ritual that he was so obviously missing.

by  mfajardo 

In fairness he was more than happy to discuss the merits of home schooling – he seemed to have a really positive view of what we’re trying to achieve, and he was incredibly flattering about the ethos we try to live by with our family and the business. I have no idea what he is doing now; he seemed to be just happily touring about the place picking up bits and pieces of life as he found them. I am happy to give all due credit to a fellow tidbitter

I wished him luck as we went our separate ways, and Steve, if you’re reading this, you’ll see that I’ve lived up to my promise and checked out the FA Cup.

Did you know your Nottingham Forest got knocked out by little old Rochdale?                 

Bio: Gemma Collier is a freelance writer and mom of two. When she’s not writing or running around after the kids, she enjoys getting stuck into a good book and the odd shopping trip when she’s has a moment to herself!