I have recently received a number of emails asking me why I rarely seem to blog about football these days. It is after all the subject of most of my books and given that the bulk of the content is forged from my opinions, it is reasonable to expect that I will have comments to make on most things relating to the great game and that a blog is the perfect place to put them.

There is however, a significant difference between the two. Yes, I know I’ve written entire volumes which amount to little more than a series of rants about this or that but books take time to research and construct and even longer to make the leap from my laptop to the shelves in Waterstones. Blogs are more instantaneous and as such, the risk to both my blood pressure and my bank balance are immeasurably greater. After all, I am knocking on a bit and I’ve almost been sued twice for things I’ve put in books and they were viewed by lawyers before they went into print! I can have a blog online in seconds so who knows what trouble that could get me into!!!

As a consequence and in a rare fit of common sense, I realised long ago that if I’m going to rant about anything in my blog, it needs to be about things into which I can try to inject either some humour or some sarcasm. Possibly even both. That isn’t to say that whatever I write isn’t genuine or heartfelt because in the main, it will be but if I’m going to do it, it’ll only be because I enjoy it.

That’s the problem I have with blogging about football. For there is so much about the great game which just simply pisses me off that I fear that at my age, my meagre brain would go into meltdown if I went off on one about it. Call me old-fashioned, but life as a gibbering wreck doesn’t hold much of an appeal.

For example, everyone knows that football has been destroyed by greed, that agents are vermin and that most players seemingly have little in the way of morals or basic intelligence. Furthermore, a significant number would almost certainly be working in MacDonald’s or languishing in prison if things had gone slightly differently for them.

On top of that, anyone with an ounce of intellect knows that the majority of football fans are so blinded by passion and loyalty that they allow their clubs to treat them in a way which would have you calling Watchdog if Tesco’s tried it. I could go on, but I am sure you get my drift.

And so as a consequence, these days I tend to dismiss everything which doesn’t happen on the field of play no matter how ridiculous or outlandish it might be as being well, sadly typical whilst anything which happens on the field is largely irrelevant because if it doesn’t involve my beloved Watford, I don’t really care anyway.

There may of course be odd occasions where I won’t be able to help myself. In fact, when I heard news that the odious John Terry had been reappointed as England captain and was busily giving it the large one to sections of the media about how harshly he’d been treated in the past, I not only almost vomited but started to reach for a keyboard.

But those occasions will be few and far between. Football has after all, become a parody of itself these days and there are only so many ways you can say that without it getting boring.

Besides, there are so many more fun things to blog about these days. Oh yes indeed.

I have recently received a number of emails asking me why I rarely seem to blog about football these days. It is after all the subject of most of my books and given that the bulk of the content is forged from my opinions, it is reasonable to expect that I will have comments to make on most things relating to the great game and that a blog is the perfect place to put them.

There is however, a significant difference between the two. Yes, I know I’ve written entire volumes which amount to little more than a series of rants about this or that but books take time to research and construct and even longer to make the leap from my laptop to the shelves in Waterstones. Blogs are more instantaneous and as such, the risk to both my blood pressure and my bank balance are immeasurably greater. After all, I am knocking on a bit and I’ve almost been sued twice for things I’ve put in books and they were viewed by lawyers before they went into print! I can have a blog online in seconds so who knows what trouble that could get me into!!!

As a consequence and in a rare fit of common sense, I realised long ago that if I’m going to rant about anything in my blog, it needs to be about things into which I can try to inject either some humour or some sarcasm. Possibly even both. That isn’t to say that whatever I write isn’t genuine or heartfelt because in the main, it will be but if I’m going to do it, it’ll only be because I enjoy it.

That’s the problem I have with blogging about football. For there is so much about the great game which just simply pisses me off that I fear that at my age, my meagre brain would go into meltdown if I went off on one about it. Call me old-fashioned, but life as a gibbering wreck doesn’t hold much of an appeal.

For example, everyone knows that football has been destroyed by greed, that agents are vermin and that most players seemingly have little in the way of morals or basic intelligence. Furthermore, a significant number would almost certainly be working in MacDonald’s or languishing in prison if things had gone slightly differently for them.

On top of that, anyone with an ounce of intellect knows that the majority of football fans are so blinded by passion and loyalty that they allow their clubs to treat them in a way which would have you calling Watchdog if Tesco’s tried it. I could go on, but I am sure you get my drift.

And so as a consequence, these days I tend to dismiss everything which doesn’t happen on the field of play no matter how ridiculous or outlandish it might be as being well, sadly typical whilst anything which happens on the field is largely irrelevant because if it doesn’t involve my beloved Watford, I don’t really care anyway.

There may of course be odd occasions where I won’t be able to help myself. In fact, when I heard news that the odious John Terry had been reappointed as England captain and was busily giving it the large one to sections of the media about how harshly he’d been treated in the past, I not only almost vomited but started to reach for a keyboard.

But those occasions will be few and far between. Football has after all, become a parody of itself these days and there are only so many ways you can say that without it getting boring.

Besides, there are so many more fun things to blog about these days. Oh yes indeed.