Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Numb and pensive in the AIL


Loitering by the side of the pitch in Coonagh last Saturday while the rain stung my face into a perky shade of royal blue, The Board got to thinking.

Nearly two years I've worked in this city, and I still don't have a rugby team. I've been to lots of club games, but the extent of my support is usually a haughty, preening salute to 'good play' that is every bit the burden of my London grammar school education.

But Dooradoyle isn't Fairlop. In Limerick that kind of objectivity will only get you beaten.

As such, I've decided that come the start of next season I will be a stubborn, unmoved, dried-in-the-wall, paint-my-face-and-slap-my-head Rugby Fan.

Easy? No no.

Who am I going to follow? I live in Raheen, so Garryowen, Old Crescent and Young Munster are all within a three mile radius. But would one of them be too obvious?

I went to school with Stephen Kelly of Shannon, and as such enjoy seeing them win, but I'll be damned if I'm going to drag my car along that dirty gutter of a back road to Coonagh every weekend.

I don't know anything about Thomond and Richmond, and I don't pretend to have the mental strength to drag my arse out to see UL Bohs or Bruff every Saturday afternoon.

Already it seems my choices are few.

2 comments:

dashoge said...

Mental strength to support Bruff? Try requisite celtic soul man.

Alan Owens said...

It's got to be Crescent, no contest. Skullduggery, abdicating coaches, nail-biting rugby with the odd exceptional win and more than a little heartbreak! Epic stuff. You can't jump and support a first division club anyway, it's like picking United or Chelsea after years of apathetic lack of support for any club...!!