THE BEGINNING…
It was the morning after the pretty wild night before at a hotel in West Hollywood. It’s a rare and beautiful thing to have a night out these days. Having 2 kids has more than altered the once thriving social life of a 30 something year old in Los Angeles. Replaced by the now 40 something year old who’s generally exhausted by 7 and falling asleep watching some shite on Netflix by 9.
So, as I sat in the hotel bar, sipping on the hair-of-the-bitch that bit me, and piecing together the previous night’s shenanigans with my fellow accomplices – the childless kind that suffer no consequences from their antics. Or “fuckers”, as I like to call them - I was introduced to a guy who had wandered over to where we were congregated. He sat with us for a while, quietly listening to our tales of debauchery.
Little did I know where this introduction would lead.
I’ve been watching football for as long as I can remember. I played it for just as long until I learned that, at my age, no matter how willing the spirit, the flesh was just too goddamn weak. And by flesh, I mean a dodgy groin and some knee shit that came from absolutely nowhere! But safe to say, growing up in Ireland, football was the be all and end all and I fucking loved it.
I moved to Los Angeles in 2013 to pursue a dream that has, over the years, evolved. Age teaches that dreams can change. And that that’s okay. When one takes a step back from whatever rat-race you’re partaking in, the dream, in a way, is actually being lived. It just had a couple of re-writes along the way.
Back in those early days a friend of mine was dancing with stars on an NBC show of ‘has beens’ and ‘who’s thats.’ He’s a fellow Irishman and football lover – although I’d argue following Leeds United is more anti-football! But that’s juts me…and millions of Man Utd fans around the world!
One particular weekend he got us tickets to watch the only team in town. LA Galaxy. I was looking forward to it. Despite it being the shittest name for a football team I had ever heard. But it was football. Robbie Keane was Captain. David Beckham had played for them. So this Irish, Manchester Utd fan, had all the ingredients in place to form a lasting bond with his hometown “soccer” team. Surely it was a match made in heaven!
Oh, but it wasn’t.
Not even a close-encounter with boyhood hero and aforementioned Utd legend, Becks, who casually walked by me in the stands that day, could get my heart racing while watching what was unfolding on the pitch. I can’t remember the result. I do remember the match ending and seeing every Galaxy player going straight over to applaud their ‘Ultra’s.’ And rightly so. Without them, the match would have been played in total silence. Every player, that is…except Captain, Robbie Keane. He posed a solemn, dare I say, disinterested figure trapsing towards the tunnel alone, conveying a feeling that, in actual fact, I too had after the match: Complete apathy. A sense of “Meh”, to use the technical term. I lamented the fact that the trip to the Home Depot stadium didn’t ignite a passion for MLS and my home town team. It should have done. I love football for Gods sake!
I never returned.
Perhaps the location of the stadium played a part in that. 20 miles was more than a bit of a trek from North Formosa Ave where I lived in Hollywood. And 20 miles in LA is the equivalent of 7,846 miles in any other country with a half thought out transport network. But really, the whole experience just didn’t land with me.
For the next 12 years I went from dodgy internet streams on my laptop to acquiring various Fox Sports & NBC Sports logins from friends and fellow football lovers who had more money than me, in pursuit of keeping up with my boyhood club, Man Utd. One login even came from a Lyft passenger I once had who, mid-trip, gave me her ex-boyfriend's details. So, thank you to her. And thanks to you too 'Soccerboy21’ for two uninterrupted seasons of Premier League action!
And that was that. Over a decade of:
Sitting on my couch.
At stupid o’clock in the morning.
By myself.
Eating Weetabix.
Getting my Football fix.
Not the most exciting of environments, no matter how late into injury time that winning goal came!
BUT THEN…
This guy. This quiet, unassuming dude. At this hotel. On this fateful hungover, post-party May afternoon, walks into my life. And through a semi-blinding headache, and with a throat as dry as Gandhi’s sandal, I find out he loves football. Something I never hear around these particular parts. That’s the first green flag (are green flags a thing?!). Then the second. He refers to it as ‘football.’ Not the natural choice of word for an American. Okay, I’m listening…
He tells me he’s a Utd fan - Oh, my brother from another mother. This is going swimmingly - and he’s a season ticket holder at LAFC. I proceed to give him details of my fleeting relationship with MLS. Of that Galaxy game. I share with him my cynicism toward his LAFC after watching their launch in 2016. Seeing an already ‘die-hard’ fan base chanting songs for a team that didn’t even have players! I mean, come on! How can you love a team that doesn’t exist?! [Insert Leeds Utd joke here].
It was all too manufactured for me. I’m Irish. We don’t play that game. Tradition is important. History defines our allegiances. We wear past achievements as badges of honour. Even if we weren’t alive to experience them. The Busby Babes. Bill Shankly’s Liverpool. Eusabio’s Benfica. LAFC didn’t speak to any of this, yet these fans were singing like their life depended on it. That they’d earned the right. That they’d been through the football mill and spat back out over and over again. That they’d been supporting a team who simultaneously broke their hearts and made them believe in a higher power! The cynicism seeping through my veins, ingrained in me from the pure fact of being born Irish, was in over-drive.
Then, a third green flag (I’m all in on the green flag analogy!) - He offers to take me to a 'match.’ Not a ‘game.’ A 'match.’ This fella definitely speaks the language. Afterall, ‘games’ are for Baseball, American Football, and that thing with a stick and net that is somewhere between Quidditch and catching a butterfly and has no business being a fucking sport!
So, I accepted his generous offer.
Was this going to be one of the best decisions I’ve made since my 5000 mile journey from the streets of Leixlip to the City of Angels? Was this beautiful, melting pot of a metropolis, full of multi-culturalism, Hollywood stardom and the home to the some of the greatest sports teams in the US - The Dodgers, The Lakers, The Rams – finally about to offer a football team worthy of my affection?
Perhaps.
But the age old questions remained:
Would the football be any good?
Would the atmosphere be any good?
Would I get that “feeling” only football can give?
And, for my part…Would I get past the prejudice I had held for over a decade?
A few days later a ticket arrived into my Apple Wallet.