Thursday 10 March 2016

Dreaming The Impossible Dream

I have been trying to avoid even thinking that Leicester might win the league, lest I jinx them.

Which would be odd enough, but I'm not even a Leicester City fan.  I think the best description might be that I'm a fellow traveller because I spent seven years in Leicester and still miss the city.  So it's more for the city that I want them to win, rather than the football team itself, much though I <3 Kasper Schmeichel, Robert Huth and Claudio Ranieri.

I arrived in Leicester for their last hurrah in the Premiership, and they were relegated at the end of that year.  I was around for that sticky patch in the old Second Division but I left before they got promoted back to the Premiership (and no, Cardiff, I still haven't forgiven you.)

One of the interesting things while I was there was how few Foxes fans I saw.  Clarendon Park was definitely Tiger country (the same way bits of Manchester are City or United).  It did seem to be a class thing, where Foxes fans tended to be people like me, while Tigers fans tended to be, well, a bit more rah (there's a reason why the 'shire' Leicstershire seats are Tory but the 'city' Leicestershire seats are Labour).

The few Foxes fans I did come across were always fun though.  There was a cafe I used to eat Saturday lunch at (a superior greasy spoon that serves chicken kievs and lasagna I can still remember the taste of even now) and a lot of the other customers when I was in were Dads with their kids eating before matches.  Most of the kids will be 12-16 now, but I'd like Leicester to win for them, to make up for freezing Saturday afternoons watching Leicester lose to Millwall.

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