armageddon
When Scotland’s clubs decided in 2012 to reject the notion of a newly-constituted corporate entity being granted direct entry to the top division of club football, there were many who cautioned that fans would disappear from the game. It would seem, as anyone who watched the New Year Edinburgh derby will know, that this process is now well underway.
Not to say that there was any difficulty in shifting the tickets. Quite the reverse in fact, Easter Road being the second venue to put up the House Full signs over the New Year fixture card – a sign that the game is doing rather better, in most parts of Scotland, than we were promised it would (one hundred thousand people attended Premiership football in Scotland over the 1-2 January programme; by percentage of the population, that’s two and a half times more than in England you know).
Rather, I refer to the mysterious vanishing of an elated Hibernian supporter, apparently vaporising into thin air as he celebrated the game’s winning goal. You will all, I am sure, have seen by now this viral sensation, picked up from the BBC’s highlights package: stood behind the net, no more than three rows back in the stand, the green-clad fellow could hardly have wished for a better view of this momentous, potentially historic Edinburgh derby event. The chance to win what may, who knows, turn out to be Easter Road’s last ever hosting of the fixture. And as Liam Craig’s spot-kick bulged the net, not ten yards from where this lucky fan was standing with arms spread in acclaim of his hero, he jumped up? and never came down. As Cabbage jubilation continues obliviously all around, it is as if the Great Trap Door of Football has opened up and swallowed this unfortunate, his punishment for daring to get excited at the deeds of his club. Gone, and not so much as a puff of smoke. Perhaps this is the Armageddon of which they spoke.
Alternatively, it may simply be that the overwhelming thrill of the moment pushed the poor soul beyond the safe limits of exhilaration, and he spontaneously disintegrated. Maybe that goal – a penalty, which by its very nature builds more anticipation than any scored in the normal run of play and therefore a more explosive release of nervous tension, and no ordinary penalty either, but one which could condemn a century-old rival to eternity reflecting on a last-ever loss in Leith – overloaded the primitive human sensory machine, just like an overpoweringly strong magnetic force can cause a critical shutdown of a Furby (handy post-Christmas hint there for the parents among us).
If it were that, then I suppose one could think of far worse ways to go. Would we not all, if we were truly honest, be quite content to peak at the rapture of our team’s ultimate triumph, rather than come back to earth with the inevitable crash of less satisfying matches to follow? Would it not have been kinder if those ecstatic feels cavorting in the Gothenburg rain had just popped like bubbles and floated off into the ether on the wings of Dons euphoria, instead of returning to be subjected to the Ian Porterfield era, then progressively worsening imitations of their cherished team?
Suffice it to say that, if recent editions of the Aberdeen-Hibernian fixture are anything to go by, there is precious little chance of anyone here tonight disappearing in a state of football frenzy, but nevertheless I’d advise you all to tread carefully. One never knows where the rapacious vortex of Armageddon will sprout up next. The SPFL needs all the fans it can get, so we certainly don’t want any more of you disappearing in unexplained circumstances.
Suffice it to say that, if recent editions of the Aberdeen-Hibernian fixture are anything to go by, there is precious little chance of anyone here tonight disappearing in a state of football frenzy, but nevertheless I’d advise you all to tread carefully. One never knows where the rapacious vortex of Armageddon will sprout up next. The SPFL needs all the fans it can get, so we certainly don’t want any more of you disappearing in unexplained circumstances.
Suffice it to say that, if recent editions of the Aberdeen-Hibernian fixture are anything to go by, there is precious little chance of anyone here tonight disappearing in a state of football frenzy, but nevertheless I’d advise you all to tread carefully. One never knows where the rapacious vortex of Armageddon will sprout up next. The SPFL needs all the fans it can get, so we certainly don’t want any more of you disappearing in unexplained circumstances.
