February 2011 Archives

I was once at the Baseball Ground, the former home of Derby County. Once was enough, it was part football ground part air raid shelter being composed of girders, crumbling concrete and corrugated iron. I mention it now as I recall how we laughed at the signs nailed to the walls outside the turnstiles; they depicted all the items you weren't allowed to take into the ground, with drawings of each.

Whilst waiting to enter the ground we amused ourselves by adding obvious items to the litany of nails, darts, fireworks, spears, knuckle dusters, etc. We journeyed from guns and grenades to intercontinental ballistic missiles but would never have thought to add teddy bears to the list.

Perhaps this proves the resourcefulness of the modern-day football hooligan; no longer content with arranging their pitched-battles by mobile phone or anti-social networking they're now concealing weapons in cuddly toys. It did make me wonder how the teddy was explained to the stewards who checked fans on the way into the ground. A cuddly toy in the webbed-fingers of a scarred skinhead with misspelled tattoos, did he tell them it was his lucky mascot?

Why does a football game last for 90 minutes? Who decided that it should be 45 minutes each way, and why? It could've been any length - 30 to 60 per half - so why 45?

I'm entirely unsure why this has not crossed my mind before. Perhaps it did and then swiftly disappeared to be replaced by more important thoughts, like what time Harry Hill was on TV tonight or where did I leave my wallet?

For reasons obvious to any other West Brom fan I'd have happily paid extra for last Saturday's match to finish at half-time, and I'd paid a lot already. The point being that you only wonder why something is the duration that it is when you want it to be shorter, or longer. Being a Black Country depressive I rarely want a match to last any longer - if we're chasing a result I rarely think that we're going to get it and perhaps statistics would back this up, but given that I can't even find the reason for 90 minutes I seem unlikely to be able to prove that belief.