Roy Hodgson is being given his marching orders, ailing in a hospital bed from all the flack the fans have given him and all the pressure the board piled on. End of an era, though we have been here before. This time it feels more fitting though, the chaotic dismay that surrounds his inevitable departure somehow instils greater respect for him from myself. His cantankerous antagonism with the media and the crowd (and himself) was one of those mask off moments. The board is rubbish and we are punching above our weight. They have never known it so good. Roy says fuck off, in his own demure way.
Of course, the turn against Hodgson was something of a sideshow – unhappiness with the team has been conflated with a wider dismay over the securitisation of the football ground from the board and the Premier League; the regulation of TIFOs, inflationary ticket prices, the over-policed environs and general hostility to the corporeal supporter. The body politic is dying, the fanatics are being dampened. The thronging mass a dying breed. Palace supporters should know: as a mediocre but long-time surviving Premier League team they know many of the downfalls and limitations of elite football, while often not seeing the benefits. They play workmanlike football, lugging from one end to the other, with the occasional moment of flair baked into a well-drilled defensive system. Diminishing returns set in. The adrenaline rushes lessening, discontent with ownership and alienation with the dominant entertainment culture coming to the fore.
I headed down to the Palace-Brighton match Christmas time. The A23 derby. Tensions were high and I wasn't prepared. Like turning up halfway through the movie for the climax, having missed the slow emotional build-up, the glum, low days of nil-nils against Bournemouth wasting your Saturday afternoon. I felt torn, always having an affectionate connection as my local team, yet supporting the shinier, more problematic, team over at SW6. Palace a team embedded in the community to a much greater degree than many other big city clubs, always chock with likeable underdog players. But this game under the lights was somewhat unexpected, the sound and fury of it.
We ambled up on wet-slickened tarmac, slowly entering the orbit of Selhurst Park through sedate residential streets. We noted a long line of police in the distance, many sat atop imposing equine creatures. They were busily making preparations as if expecting a riot (some looked like TSG to my paranoid eyes); it was reminiscent of that typical moment when the respectable crowd of a large protest drift off and the up-to-no-gooders fend for themselves in the descending darkness. This didn't seem to be normal. And, so it was, round the corner the drunken Brighton lot rushed through – presumably being chaperoned from their coaches to the ground – jeering abuse and vaguely pretending to spoil for a fight. It definitely got your heart pumping.
We entered the stadium to an intense club mix of xmas tunes and fireworks. It was impressive and unexpected. A real spectacle. Tried to get to our seats, people being obtuse. Fella tells me to get a move on while we find our seats. Nice to see you too. Next to us a daughter and her mum chunter away all game in half disgust. Behind, a bunch of young lads banter away affably. The game itself was interesting enough – Brighton were skillful and technical, Palace started brightly scoring and then backed off low block-style. 1-1. Good score against a superior opponent, though trepidation and anxiety built through the game. “They are not 90 minute players,” was a pretty common refrain. Somewhat problematic you would think. Chants exulting J-P “Most Improved” Mateta as the greatest striker in the room with not half the whiff of sarcasm in those breathy rhythms.
I left the game pretty ambivalent, not fully being able to share in the joys, pain and anxieties of my fellow spectators. Going to football the last few years has been about assembly more than anything. Various non-league games, a couple trips to the Valley and so on. An excuse to congregate with friends, travel round town and participate in something mildly stimulating. The spectacle is usually quite low-key and that generally enables a fair footing for building a social rapport, a place to activate the senses fairly gently, to feel something and make sense of it with others.
But this Palace game was different: far more passionate and tied up with the emotional intensity that the Christmas-New Years period exudes. It was also not celebratory in that spontaneous or sentimental way. There was a narrative at play that meant a lot to those around, but from which I felt estranged from despite following the teams progress at a distance. It makes one think about the role these micro-narratives have in our highly-structured societies.
There is a distractive quality to it all, something superficial to the sort of emotion tied up in such staging, yet does it really differ from more choreographed cultural performance? One that would be venerated for its composition and societal insight by force of authorial intent and production value. Of course, football is situated directly in its locality - that which gives it its social base and contradicts the deterritorial move of global capital. The open-door of the media spectator contra the closed-door of the support base. Perhaps ambivalence, when surrounded with such caustic contradiction, is the reasonable response. Soaking it all up and observing what will wash out — in the break from ground to sky.