The pint is always half empty

Firstly, I’d like to apologise for this week’s entry being posted on a Tuesday and not a Monday. I realise this flies in the face of the whole premise of the blog, but hopefully you will see from this entry that there is good reason as to why I wasn’t able to tap out this week’s look at the beautiful game yesterday.

That good reason is that I spent yesterday evening in the pub. On my own. I know what you’re thinking but I definitely don’t have a drink problem. However, I do have a particularly bad not-having-an-ESPN-subscription problem and my team are playing away and it’s live on said broadcaster.

Watching football is one of only two pastimes I can think of that are acceptable to do alone in a pub. The other is reading the paper on a Sunday afternoon, accompanied by a cold pint or two. Anything else is almost certainly a convenient way to mask a mild form of alcoholism.

An attack of lethargy brought on by the fact that it’s Monday night and I’m far from confident that my team will take anything from the game means I can only muster enough energy to stroll down to the pub at the end of the road – rather than meet friends slightly further afield.

The local is a welcoming place tonight, with plenty of customers decked out in the colours of my team. After buying a drink, I seek out the most appropriate place for a man of 27 drinking on his own on a Monday night to sit. And by “most appropriate”, I obviously mean “least visible to others”.

As I’m slightly late and possibly as some kind of punishment for entering alone, the only seating position left is on a small stool placed just to the right of a huge plasma screen television. If it wasn’t for the fact that this seat is also placed in both touching and smelling distance of the men’s toilet, it would be a great spot.

Within two minutes of kick off my team are 1-0 down. Within five minutes it should be 2-0, and within 10 it could easily have been 4-0. Things are not going to plan and while I promised myself I would keep my head down and not draw attention to myself, my team are playing so abysmally that I’ve already stood from my stool and sworn loudly at the television a number of times.

Miraculously my team score against the run of play, and I’m one of many men who are on their feet and clapping footage of our striker celebrating. This feels a lot more comfortable. It doesn’t matter who you are down the pub with when you’re team scores – we’re all in this together right?

Not quite. The home side regain the lead and the pub puts it's collective head down. I look around, theatrically shaking my head and wording things like “shambles” to try and prompt some response from my fellow fans. It’s to no avail though, and everyone returns to their conversations – safe in the knowledge that our team will be collecting no points tonight.

Despite having an equaliser wrongly chalked off for a foul, my team are never really in the game again and the home side finish us off with a third goal – owed much to some comical defending on our part.
As the game draws to a close, a well oiled regular stops his charge to the toilet to address the corner of the pub where I’m positioned and ask who supports my team. I’m not in the mood to talk at this point, especially to a man who looks like he has actually enjoyed himself whilst this farce is played out on the screen. But given that he is little more than a yard away from me and staring straight at my face, ignoring him is not really an option.

Ignore him I do though, hoping he will be disheartened by the lukewarm response his question garnered and continue towards the toilet. Aptly enough for a night when most things go wrong, he asks again – this time addressing me specifically. As painful as it is, I admit to supporting my team and he rightly takes issue with me ignoring him originally. Great, a thumping defeat for my team and now the potential for an actual thumping for me.

The man sees I am broken already and offers the correct but insignificant consolation that our second goal should have stood. I agree and offer a half-hearted “never mind though” before exiting the pub as the referee blows the final whistle.

It’s not been an enjoyable night. I trudge back to my flat with my hands in my pockets, already working on a plan to convince my flatmates to subscribe to ESPN - thus saving me from having to suffer this indignity again.