Neckties & Earl Grey Skies

We have yet to tour the sites from Ted Lasso but are embracing the love for football here.

1. It is a safe way to connect with friends. Many of the boys’ classmates enjoy a match of football during break or during after-school club. Many of the children are SO competitive that the school has actually designated certain days to each class to play football during break so that the younger kids can play without getting hurt.
2. The “kits”, known as a uniform to us Americans, are essential to looking the part. Kids who stay for after-school club or who attend the clinics in town, attend fully kitted out (including ours now).
3. Most kids within the school know who “supports” which football team. Jack can tell you which teams his classmates AND teachers support! Jack has decided Manchester City is the team he supports in the Premier League.

We attended one Reading Royals match (3rd tier match) during the regular season and the children could not believe how GOOD the players were. Reading beat Blackpool 3-2. Each time Reading scored, the kids jumped up in their seats and loved joining in on the celebratory song, dancing and cheering.

We went to one pre-season Royals game since and it was just as fun. They beat QPR, which is in the league above Reading, 1-0. Jack made signs for us to hold up during the game. It was so sweet! Fully embracing this way of life, all of us wore Royals gear.

We are now “Loyal Royals”. The kids talked Tim into buying Royal kits, which they proudly sport, and is apparently not very common here in town (usually these are Premier League Kits…).

Both kids participate in football club after school. The level of play of some of these kids is insanity to me. It’s as if football comes as naturally as walking to some of them. Will often runs around yelling at his teammates to “pass!!! I’m open!!!” – in the few times I have observed this, he was NOT open.

The Euros played in July, which made it a very exciting month! We watched many of the matches over dinner and it created a buzz at school. Jack’s classmates were assigned different teams in school (Jack was assigned Croatia) to have some friendly competition. England made it to the finals and though they lost to Spain, it was SO exciting.

Below: Will getting ready to watch the final game England vs. Spain.

Jack has enjoyed reading The Ultimate Football Heroes book series and Pickford (England goalkeeper) is the next on his shelf. He has also started collecting football cards! Will has started collecting cat cards.

And then there was the Olympics! More football stories to come…

Vocabulary

1. Kit – uniform
2. The pitch – the field
3. Boots – cleats (or in the words of Will, “cleaks”)
4. Tackle – to steal the ball
5. ALL profanities – the language spoken by most fans (big and small) in football stadiums