Parky

I was reading a blog post over the weekend, by Lisa at Mrs LJ Hall who was mulling over who would be her fantasy husband(s). It has given me the perfect opportunity to tell you about one of mine.

If you'd asked me in the late 90s, I would have said Gary Parkinson, without a doubt. Most of you are sitting looking blankly at the screen, saying "Wha'?" so I feel it my duty to include a picture of him, although it's not great. Gary - known as Parky, obviously - was a right back, who joined Preston from Burnley in 1997. The picture here shows him playing for Middlesbrough, much earlier in his career.

Now, I don't normally go lusting after footballers. As a fan, I am not the sort that goes to football to watch men's buttocks; I am genuinely interested in the football. But I became a big fan of Parky after a chance meeting one day in August 1998. It was Bank Holiday weekend and PNE were playing at Lincoln City. I drove up to Lincoln alone but was meeting a friend who was coming from Liverpool to see the match. I drove out to the point-to-point on the edge of the city to park there to meet my friend as they were going to be driving past so was a convenient place to stop.

When I pulled into the car park, I noticed the team coach. It was empty, apart from the driver. Being a) curious nosey and b) having time to kill, I wandered over, spoke to the driver and asked him if he'd already dropped the team off. He shook his head, pointed to a path and said, "They've gone for a walk." I walked around the corner, and sure enough, there was the whole squad and entourage wandering around. Gary was the first person I bumped into and he stopped to talk to me, for I was wearing both a PNE shirt and an utterly amazed look on my face. We chatted for a couple of minutes and he explained that the boss - David Moyes at the time - liked them to stretch their legs after a long journey before they got to the ground. He was quietly spoken and charming, with lovely twinkly eyes. After this brief chat, he apologised and said they had to leave. Stupidly, I never asked for any autographs but I got a few hellos as they traipsed back onto the bus and left. I'm not sure my friend totally believed me when they turned up about ten minutes later!

After that encounter, Parky became my fantasy husband. I think I met him again, briefly, at a Player of the Year awards ceremony a couple of years later and he was as charming as before. Unfortunately, about six months after I met him, he damaged his cruciate and was out for a year and never really featured regularly for Preston after that so I didn't often get my fix of my favourite player. He left PNE for Blackpool in 2001, normally a move that would generate a lot of bad feeling, but no-one could really begrudge him moving on at the age of 33. He helped them win promotion that season and then retired from playing a couple of years later. He got himself a job back at Blackpool as head of youth after qualifying as a coach.

This story does not have a happy ending. Earlier this month, I was utterly gutted to hear the news that Gary had suffered a massive stroke and was critically ill in hospital. Although he has improved, there are now fears that he is suffering from locked-in syndrome, whereby he is unable to move, speak or swallow but is aware of what is going on around them. It is early days in his rehabilitation but if confirmed, the prognosis is not good as most sufferers die within the first four months. A few manage to overcome it with specialist care; I'm hoping, praying even, that he's one of them. He's only 42 after all. My heart totally goes out to his wife Deborah and their three children as I can only imagine what they are going through right now. And as for Parky, I've tried to imagine what it might be like right now; to be aware of everything around you, and yet not be able to respond, to express emotions, to talk to loved ones or even to move. Boy, is it scary and frustrating - and yet, I can shake myself out of it a few seconds later, move, type, talk and generally express myself. To be like that 24x7 - well, the thought makes me shudder.

I'm hoping in the months to come that there will be some fundraising to help either him or stroke-related causes. Thus far, I haven't found anything on the Blackpool FC website (and yes, I did check it; I am not proud). A donation to The Stroke Association, a charity that supports research into prevention and treatment of strokes as well as providing information, advice and support to stroke victims, may well be in order. If any event is set up in Parky's name, I will be supporting it wholeheartedly and I'll tell you about it here. If anyone knows of any event set up in his name, please let me know because I would love to be involved.

In the meantime, I prefer to remember Parky as the player and the lovely, genuine man that he was. That doesn't mean I am not hoping for the miracle recovery he deserves because I am crossing everything that it happens. But he will remain my fantasy husband. Get well soon, Parky. You are in my thoughts.

Football rivalries: not in front of the children!

I'm not from Preston, so I never understood why I must "hate" Blackpool FC . In this house, hating Blackpool is not good for marital / family harmony, as my husband is from Blackpool and Monkey has been to Wembley with him. Nor does my husband "hate" PNE either. It generates a bit of banter, but that's it. We are reunited in a greater dislike of another Lancashire (Burnley) but truly, I don't "hate" them.

Football rivalries are usually logical. They're local - look across the city or down the road, find the nearest team and there you go. Instant hatred. Hence , in Lancashire, there's Burnley and Blackburn "hating" in one corner and Preston and Blackpool in the other, even tho Preston and Blackburn are closest together. There is rivalry but not in an "all-police-leave-cancelled-and-away-supporters-must-arrive-on-coaches" way.

Rivalries also develop through "familiarity breeds contempt"- you don't play your rivals as you're in different divisions so the next local team you play regularly does instead. Hence my dislike of Burnley although Francis Stanley Ternent has a lot to answer for (Look him up if you must; try a recording of his voice .... *winces*).

Some are less easy to fathom. One of my regular readers won't like this, but I could cheerfully never attend a match involving Gillingham ever again. For many years, whenever PNE changed division, Gillingham came with us. Matches involving the teams were turgid affairs and Gillingham were responsible for my two worst football moments. The first was a play-off semi final defeat at Priestfield in 1999 where I shouted myself hoarse in frustration for 90 minutes. The second was the first game of the 2001-2002 season - you know, the one where hope springs eternal. We got thrashed 5-0. I left at 4-0, and I got sunburn for good measure. In the UK, many such rivalries are rooted in the bad days of hooliganism.

In Spain, they have their own word for the passion generated by rivalries. Morbo. It doesn't translate into English well, although Phil Ball in his brilliant book "Morbo: The Story of Spanish Football" tries. The rivalries to beat all rivalries in Spain is between FC Barcelona and Real Madrid; huge rivals as well as two of the biggest teams in the world. The basis of their rivalry goes way beyond football - FC Barcelona is often seen as the flagship of the Catalan people who want independence from Spain, whereas Real is seen to represent the Spanish state and, in Franco's days, the Generalisimo's team. God help anyone that leaves one club for the other. The last one that did, Luis Figo, had half a pig's head (how?) and several mobile phones (why?) thrown at him at the Nou Camp when the teams met for the first time after his transfer.

I guess these rivalries make football interesting for the neutral and important for the passionate fan. But I have a problem with them. It is that these rivalries foster incredible hatred. "Hate" is a word I try not to use these days now that I have small children with pin-sharp selective hearing and an ability to copy more finely honed than Xerox. As an adult, you can use the word to other adults and know it won't get taken the wrong way. As a mother with children learning the ways of the world, hate is too emotive a term. I may not be perfect at it, but I try not to say it. It doesn't stop them using the word from time to time - Monkey, in his mock teenager stroppy moments when tired after school, has been known to shout "I hate you" at me from the back of the car when I have dared to refuse his myriad demands. He gets reminded that you say "I don't like you" - and then I tell him I don't like him much sometimes, but everyone has moments like that.

I'm sure many parents do the same sort of thing. I'm sure parents who are football fans do too. But when it comes to rivalries in football, people often seem to lose their sense of proportion. It seems like children of some fans are raised to "hate" their rivals. They learn to hate someone because of the team they support or the town (or country - let it not be forgotten that many England fans still hate Germany, some of which stems back to a war won 65 years ago) where they were born or reside. It's localised xenophobia, as random as hating someone because of the colour of their skin, the religion they follow or their sexuality, all of which are illegal. Surely, this is no better? But it goes on, all over the world, all the time. We think the days of mindless football violence have gone but only last August, there was mass violence at the first match between West Ham and Millwall for 5 years and a supporter got stabbed. Why is that right? And don't think our kids don't see it. They do. Children can be subjected to bad language and hatred at any game as Julia bemoaned in her post last week. The picture on her post says it all - a small child, making an obscene gesture clearly aimed at rival supporters, dressed in a replica kit.

The FA's Respect campaign aims to address all unacceptable behaviour, on and off the pitch, at all levels of the game and the hatred that these rivalries stir up is part of the football culture that is unpalatable to most (I hope!). It deserves to succeed so our children can enjoy the game that many of us love without encountering unnecessary hatred like this.

Football is, by its very nature, a tribal and passionate game, whether it is played at the local park or at Wembley. Let's keep the passion, lose the hatred and hope our children enjoy healthy rivalries in football that are tolerant and yes, respectful.

(The link to Morbo on Amazon is not an affiliate link; I just think the book is a brilliant read.)

My day in reality

It mostly worked. :)

I wake up feeling fairly odd for reasons that don't concern this blog. I hear Monkey moving around about 6.30 going to the toilet but he doesn't come in until nearly 8, which was good. I stay in bed for a while whilst the men of the house went downstairs but eventually drag myself out and into gym gear.

The plan was leisurely breakfast, workout, shower. As it turns out, I eat my breakfast and before I know it, Monkey's turning on the Wii and handing me the stuff I need to do my EASA workout, about 10 minutes after my breakfast hit my stomach (Slave driver, much?!). Probably not the best idea, but actually, the porridge lump in my stomach distracts me from the pain of doing the exercises. Urgh. But I survive and complete another 30 day challenge, my second and this one on the hard setting.

So, onto the football. Monkey is beside himself, and puts on his Barca top specially for the occasion. (A PNE top for him might be a step too far for some in the family). He puts one of my caps on and despite being only 5, finds it fit with only a minor adjustment. He has a big head. I know, the trouble he caused me a birth is another story for another day.

After packing his fave snack (cheese and raisins) and some juice in an unfortunately orange bottle, we set off. Now, the rear seatbelt on my car is not working so I have a child car seat on the passenger seat so Monkey sits in the front. I never realised that he's such a blimmin' backseat driver. He tells me to get in the right lane so we could leave the M6, albeit a junction earlier than I normally do and when we approach the next junction, he's there waving his arms across to direct me left.

After a quick trip to the pub for sparkling water, (me) fruit shoot, (him) and sausage and chips (shared) we set off for the ground. It's a lovely day and I feel overdressed just wearing a top and a light coat. We walk up to the Splash statue. where I take a photo of Monkey beside and tweet it. There are more people hanging around here and there's more of an atmosphere. We wander around to our turnstile and I stop to get a cup of tea to take on (the tea in the ground is foul) whereupon I bump into some people I haven't seen in years. Monkey just wants to go in. He takes his own ticket and wanders up to the turnstile himself bold as brass.

Having found our seats, we settle in with Monkey's eyes now as wide as saucers. In front of us is the archetypal bloke you find at footie matches - large build, large voice, likely to block your view and pollute your ears. But this is the family stand so let's hope he keeps it clean.

The players come out and everyone claps. Monkey keeps looking around but seems to take everything in and  learns quite quickly. He sits crosslegged on the seat as the game begins, listening to the football coverage on my DAB radio with random comments like "Mummy! Hull have got 1-0.... " . He asks random questions, like whose keeper is that, who are the white team playing for (err.........),  and why is the ref's shirt so bright. The game settles into a pattern I don't like - we're doing all the defending, Scunny have all the chances. I'm just about to tweet something along those lines and we nearly score! The ground is quiet, too quiet, unless there is some action. The attendance is poor.

Finally, coming up to the half hour, we score after a poor clearance falls kindly. I'd had my tweet planned on this one "Beeeeeast! 1-0" for it is Jon Parkin who gets his name on the scoresheet and he's known as "the Beast". We jump up and cheer, along with everyone else. Monkey is being unusually well behaved. Let's hope it lasts, I think.

Half time 1-0. I get distracted by my phone at half time but we eventually take a trip to the toilets, whereupon Monkey leaves my DAB in a cubicle. Mind you, we've left it so late, the toilets are empty and it gets retrieved. There's not even a queue for pies but Monkey has changed his mind yet again and doesn't want one so I don't bother. The food part of this post is fast heading west.

We settle down for the second half and I decide to nab the DAB - see what I did there? - to listen to the Grand National. This becomes a Very Bad Idea as I'm half distracted by the race and all of a sudden, we're 1-1 after a shoddy backpass. Still, it would seem bad form not to tweet again so send my missive then hand the radio back to Monkey. He's getting more into now, egged on by the "Come On Preston" shouts from the woman behind me and aforementioned loud big man. Thankfully, his worst expletive is "sodding" and the only reaction his shouting gets from Monkey is hysterical giggles which makes everyone look round. A year ago, he'd have been pleading with me to leave because of the noise. He seems to clap in all the right places and kind of joins in with the singing.

A few minutes later, and the day takes a turn for the worse. Another apparent screw up and we're 2-1 down. Sit and think "this is it, we're getting relegated finally" and start to forget I'm with a 5yo boy so start to shout like the rest of the frustrated crowd. Monkey starts to shout randomly too.

The clock ticks down. 5 minutes to go. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a goal to us - the ball ends up in the box, and on the second attempt, we score with a header. 86 mins. 4 to go plus time added on. Shall I get him out whilst I can? Relief. Surely a point will help our quest to stay up? Can we get the extra two points?

They announce the time added on and the crowd roars the team on again. I ask Monkey if he wants to go now. He says "no, I want to stay to see if they win" so I give in as the crowd is not huge. The ball moves forward at the feet of the recently announced man of the match. Out of nowhere, he curls a shot - straight into the top left hand corner. We jump up, we shout - no, we scream! - we cheer, we clap. Just a few more seconds to hang on (when you're a footy fan, you soon learn to become a pessimist about your team's ability to hold a lead).

A few seconds later and it's all over. I worried about getting him out in the crush but needn't have - it's not too bad and he happily gets himself out without getting tipped over or booted. He wants to ring his granddad straight away but as he is a Blackpool fan, I decide it might be more diplomatic to wait a bit.

As we walk back to the car, Monkey decides he wants "tea" and so I buy a jumbo hot dog for him. He proceeds to devour this before we reach the car a few minutes walk away. As we set off home in the car, he says "It wasn't a good day for Scunthorpe, was it?". I laugh. We go home. He's been a little star today, my Monkey, and he's had a ball. As soon as we get home, Missy Woo rings to say hello - tho manages not to talk to me - and Monkey spends 5 minutes telling Granddad all about it, his first football match. He wants to go again but I don't think Granddad will take him to the last match of the season.

So, no pie. That's the food part of the blog stuffed for today. Or is it? I head out to Asda for supplies after getting back and make the world's quickest chilli which I stuff on top of tortillas, grate cheese over and grill to make nachos. I put avocado on top of mine to make it vaguely healthy as my veg content has been sorely lacking today. And to make matters worse, I pour myself a glass of wine. Healthy eating, it is not.

9pm comes around and it's THE game of the day. I write this post and watch El Clasico at the same time. Half an hour in and Messi takes a pass on his chest, gets the ball under the defender and past Casillas for the first goal. Madrid have some good chances but don't look like scoring so the first half ends 1-0 to Barca. Ten minutes into the second half, Xavi passes the ball forward to Pedro who coolly slots home. 2-0. Game over really. Madrid get the ball in the net but it gets disallowed. Not their day. They never look totally like scoring. The game ends and Barca go top of La Liga once more.

That was my day. A lot closer to the original plan than I thought possible. Not every day goes this well in the kateab household, believe me. We're all happy. 3 important points for each of my favourite teams. And I may yet make a PNE fan out of my son.