London, my London

A defining moment of the Viking Age came in 1066 at the village of Stamford Bridge. It was here where King Harold Godwinson defeated invading Norwegian forces under the command of King Harald Hardrada and Tostig Godwinson, Harold’s brother.

This Stamford Bridge, however, was, and still is, in Yorkshire, north of England. Nothing to do with the one in SW6, London; the finish line of my three-stadium bike-tour. And yet, I saw parallels between the two places.

For the last thirteen years there has been a battle in English football, specifically in the top division, namely, the Premier League. This conflict has gone beyond the terraces. It is more a financial matter than a fan-driven one. It has pitted owners versus cash-strapped supporters. It has awakened followers, football-refuseniks and neutrals to the reality of modern soccer. At the heart of this issue is the sport itself, what it used to be and what it has become.

In the summer of 2003, Roman Abramovich, Russian billionaire, arrived at Stamford Bridge, southwestern London, to take over Chelsea Football Club. On doing this he changed the face of the sport forever. In that first summer, Chelsea spent £110m on 13 players. This set the tone for the various takeovers that would happen in subsequent years: Manchester City, Manchester united and Liverpool Football Club are all now foreign-owned. The latter, with its well-proven pedigree in the sport, was bought by the Fenway Sports Group. Anyone familiar with baseball will recognise the first word in that company’s name. It is the name of the Boston Red Sox's stadium.

As I stood outside CFC's home ground, giving both my bike and myself a much-needed rest, I could not help thinking that the only times I had been inside “The Bridge” (as we fans call it) had been to purchase merchandise in its shop or as participant in events held on its premises. I had never been to a match. The ticket price was too high for me. In this bloodless battle over who bought which club I could see only one casualty: the loyal football fan.

In the hot midday sun, I also reflected on how this tug-of-war was not limited just to the Premier League. I had just cycled from one end of the city to the other. 34.4 miles in three hours, fifty minutes and 25 seconds. Along the way I had seen deprivation, regeneration-linked gentrification, magical and practical urbanisation and new-money invasion. The well-designed housing estates on the almost-traffic-free Grosvenor Road in Pimlico, contrasted with the 60s-built, ordinary-looking Tottenham mid-rises. In the minimalist properties in SW3 I imagined most notes were scribbled using the Cyrillic alphabet these days. Council properties in East London were being flogged off in the Far East at plush fairs to prospective buyers who never had any intention of relocating to Britain. It was not just football where the playing field had changed for the worse. Unlike in 1066 the battle was not between an invading force and a fearless home-grown army but between unbridled free-market power and national sovereignty. For all that the rightwing press railed against “foreign welfare scroungers”, they were letting off the hook the tycoons whose tax contributions to the Exchequer were, at most, risible. Some of them lived in the white doll-looking houses past which I had just cycled.

I had conceived the idea of the three-stadium bike-tour based on the fact that Tottenham Hotspurs, my starting point, had not won the league since 1961. Arsenal’s Emirates, my next stop, had not tasted success in England’s elite football competition for eleven years, whereas Chelsea, at whose stadium I was now, had won four Premier League titles since Abramovich's takeover. From former to current glories. Irony of ironies. Look at the table now and see who is doing better and who is doing worse. During my journey, though, I realised that I was also taking the lid off another London. One that had eluded me all these years, either because I was just another commuter going from A to B, or because I was not looking at the whole picture. Stamford Bridge gave me that final – but still only temporary – piece of the puzzle. Roman’s pet project had unwittingly become a synecdoche, not just for football but also for what was happening in London, property-wise, investment-wise, finances-wise. The part that was being used for the whole. Suddenly, Stamford Bridge, Yorkshire and its SW6 cousin were no longer just two places in England, separated by hundreds of miles, but two conflict zones. The former, steeped in history, the latter’s outcome, yet to be known.

© 2016

Next Post: “Living in a Multilingual World”, to be published on Tuesday 23rd February at 6pm (GMT)

Urban Diary

As soon as I get off at Victoria station I notice the buzz. The blue and white scarves, the Samsung logo emblazoned across the shirts. The District/Circle Line platform is alive with the sounds of victory chants. ¡Campeones, campeones, olé, olé, olé!. It might feel strange to hear Spanish words amongst the mainly Anglophone crowd but this is the Premier League we are talking about here, the multi-million pound business that makes globalisation feel real and palpable. Chelsea Football Club has a powerful Brazil-born Spanish striker up front, a no-nonsense Serbian midfielder sitting in front of the defence, a promising, up-and-coming Dutch left-back and a world-class Belgian goalkeeper. Only two of Chelsea’s all-conquering regular team were born in this country. Who cares, though? Today it is all about celebrating.

What was a trickle at Victoria station becomes a flood thronging out at the gates of Fulham Broadway tube station. The Royal blue flags are out and for a couple of square miles become the only sight to behold. Correction: the only beautiful sight to behold. As I take up my position behind one of the barriers to see the three open-top victory parade buses I scan the crowd. Standing next to the cockney-rhyming-slang Londoners are turbaned Sikhs, pram-pushing Eastern-European-looking men and hijab-wearing Muslim women. Families mill out and about, the atmosphere is more suitable to Alton Towers than Fulham Road. But this is modern football, served with a tall skinny latte.

The temperature cannot seem to make its mind up. My hoodie is pulled down and pulled back up in quick succession. I regret my decision not to wear anything Chelsea today. I console myself with the thought that since where I live is not an SW6 postcode I am being sensible by not standing out. But I feel jealous of my fellow supporters. I, too, have got the shirts, the jumpers and the hoodies. Back home.

Suddenly there is a roar. The first of the three buses appears at the top of the road. The blue flags are hoisted higher. The chants grow louder. Parents hug their children closer. Selfie sticks spring up. Smartphones are held aloft. The players wave from the bus. The crowd waves back. London shrinks.

© 2015


Photo by the blog author

Next Post: “Saturday Evenings: Stay In, Sit Up and Switch On”, to be published on Saturday 30^th May at 6pm (GMT)

Meditations on Britain (Motif Sportif)

It has taken me sixty-seven days to write this column. As John Terry's foot slipped on the Moscow damp ground, Chelsea's hopes of European glory were given a deadly blow.

I have never intended this blog to be about sport. As a fellow blogger remarked recently, the mix of literary reviews, reflections on my life in Britain, more pertinently in London, music sections and recipes (with music to listen to whilst eating) form the bulk of this space. But, even the most hardened of souls would have felt for the England and Chelsea captain when his shot flew wide of the intended target.

That's why when I was at Stamford Bridge recently (for the first time in my life) I was struck by the image that presented itself in front of my eyes. A tractor was flattening the ground on the pitch. And as the vehicle moved from right to left I could not help thinking that that was a metaphor for how our season went. One by one the chances to silverware came tumbling down like the mounds of soil on the pitch. The nail on the coffin was that night in Moscow.

Although I rarely write about sport on this blog that doesn’t mean that I am indifferent to it. I am passionate about both arts and sports equally, living to the core the Greek maxim: ‘Healthy mind in healthy body’. Both disciplines carry within them the ethos of enjoyment, resilience and narcissism. Where they both differ is in the pursuit of their goals. Whereas art concerns itself more with the process of creation (or it should, at any rate), for sportspeople, the result is everything. John Terry, on the night of Wednesday 21st May, 2008, probably left aside thoughts about the long road traversed by Chelsea to arrive at its first ever European final, especially after the most successful manager in the club’s history, Jose Mourinho, had walked out in September 2007. He probably excluded the facts and statistics that pointed at a club struggling to remain within sight of the champions, Manchester United, when its main players were either injured or on international duty. He probably chose to forget about players' discontent with Mourinho’s replacement, Avram Grant, who, by the way, was sacked by the club’s hierarchy following his defeat in the European Cup Final.

Art is more forgiving, though and so are its audiences. When on a warm Sunday afternoon I was in attendance at the Grand Theatre of Havana in the mid 90s nothing could have warned me that I was about to witness history being made. The bill promised a Swan Lake performed by none other than Lorna Feijóo, my favourite ballet dancer ever. Next to me sat my then German course teacher, an Austrian woman, with her boyfriend by her side. I had been raving about Lorna for so long that they both thought I was more than just a good acquaintance of hers.

The piece went smoothly and Lorna handled the various pas de deux with aplomb and vigour. But then came the strenuous and difficult role of Odile and the unexpected happened. Halfway through a spin, Lorna slipped and fell. The audience leant forward and covered their eyes with their hands and the atmosphere felt oppressive, as if someone had sucked the air out of the building. Lorna rose up once again and in a defiant, daring and challenging manner, dusted herself off (literally) and gave us a series of fuettés, each one of them improving on the previous one. The public went mad (not unheard of in Cuba) with cries and wild applause and the critics raved about the performance for a long time after.

Two top spectacles and yet what consolation can John Terry get from a game that was almost won, but wasn’t? And that’s that the sad reality of sport, almost counts for nothing. Who knows? Maybe Terry could learn a thing or two from Lorna if they ever ran into each other.

Copyright 2008