The Beautiful Game

 Day Three: At the game



I realise in these modern times we are now more open and accepting of things which people once regarded with suspicion, if not hostility. What was once a private shame that could be put down as a character defect is now allowed to be shared in public. Not everyone is ok with this but you just have to educate and hope new generations will accept you for what you are. It is with that in mind that I can proclaim ‘I like football.’ I’ve always liked football, even when I was seven. Yes, you might say ‘how could you know’. Was I just doing it for attention and to be different, All I can say is it would have been much easier not to. Supporting Chelsea in the late 70s and early 80s was pure masochism, with much less option to dress up.


I think I like football more than I support a team. The infinite possibilities created by a simple idea of 22 people and a ball’ the evolution of tactics the social dimensions of fandom, the politics of the game, there are so many facets to it. I can’t quite manage the religious certainty to be able to declaim the perfect nature of the team I support while decrying ‘the other’ as being vile beyond hope of redemption - whatever the evidence holds. Possibly this comes from having lost 18-0 in Cub Football and seeing a whole range of local clubs fold or decline - Romford, Stafford Rangers, VS Rugby and, recently, Scunthorpe. I listen to the Spanish Football Pod and The Guardian’s Football Weekly with one conviction. Enjoy interesting people saying interesting things. Don’t try and understand it, just enjoy it, if you understand it you would have to have opinions and the real joy of that is that, it isn’t a matter of life and death, it is sooo much less important than that,

I say all that because we have come to Estadio Municipal Verónica Boquete de San Lázaro, formerly called Estadio Multiusos de San Lázaro, the ground of Sociedade Deportiva Compostela - and sports arena for the area. Football was brought to Spain in the late 19th century by expat workers and the locals made it there, own. The development of it is fascinating, as is the rivalry between Real Madrid and Barcelona which is well covered in https://www.hive.co.uk/Product/Sid-Lowe/Fear-and-Loathing-in-La-Liga--Barcelona-vs-Real-Madrid/15614974 I decided to follow a team in Spain to give me a focus. The Thorpe magic got to work. Let me tell you how SD Compostela went bust.

The first Compostela team was created in 1928 during the first flowering of national football. It ceased to function in 1946. In 1962 a new team was formed and hang around the 3rd and 4th tier of Spanish football. In 19921 they climbed up to the second division and in 1994 got to the first. At this time, with no knowledge other than I had visited the city I bought a keyring with club colours a swore fealty. This was not a wise choice.

Spain is full of financially fiascos in footballing terms. Before we sit back too smugly I am told that outside a few English clubs the same is true here. Compostela was one such club where the chickens came home to roost. Footballing failure - demotion the 2nd, in 1998; was followed by the eventual arrival in the 5th tier and insolvency in 2007. What we would call a phoenix club emerged in 2004. It stepped in in 2006 and the club rose from the 8th tier to its current place in the 4th tier. It is one of five regional leagues. Compostela play teams from Asturias, Galicia, Canatbria and Castile Y Leon.

Tomorrow… trains.




Today's walk pic. Our local field of dreams

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