It already annoys me: football is nostalgia

If football is so present, why are we fans so nostalgic? What a Christmas: Txetxu Rojo dies, O'Rei Pelé is dying, Serrat – a comrade in the lead years – retires and we say goodbye to the year with an FC Barcelona-RCD Espanyol devoid of low passions.

Thomas Osborne
Thomas Osborne
28 December 2022 Wednesday 00:36
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It already annoys me: football is nostalgia

If football is so present, why are we fans so nostalgic? What a Christmas: Txetxu Rojo dies, O'Rei Pelé is dying, Serrat – a comrade in the lead years – retires and we say goodbye to the year with an FC Barcelona-RCD Espanyol devoid of low passions.

Every time an idol dies, a night thief breaks into the house and rips off a sticker from my album of old leagues. If it were to complete his, the thing would be theft and he would have a pass. The bad thing is that he tears them off and it stays so wide, without imagining the sadness caused by the albums that we completed one day and today have holes. Rojo was one of the few soccer players who weren't as ugly as hitting a father. He had an underappreciated elegance, a certain pretty boy cockiness and some virtues of a footballer ahead of the times, which is why he divided San Mamés, which today cries for him and for good reason.

Pele! In his twenty-something-year career, we only saw him at the World Cups, that is, every four years and that way. Even without television, his figure was indisputable, non-negotiable: he was the best, point ball. He confirmed it in the first World Cup with widespread television coverage –Mexico 1970–, when he eternally won over fans from all over the world. The years did not seem to pass for Pelé until today, bedridden in a hospital where feints, dribbling, unchecking are useless, and the rival goalkeeper is not ahead. Of course, Pelé's Santos was eliminated in the 1974 Carranza trophy by RCD Español –a great Rodilla tournament– and they faced Johan Cruyff's Barça... for the party of third and fourth place.

And Serrate? What paints here? The spirit of resistance of the years of lead: without leagues, without European titles, hoping to see God one day and, above all, Real Madrid bite the dust at the Camp Nou. I only remember two famous singers in all of Spain from Barça: Serrat and Manolo Escobar. The merengues, on the other hand, gave to form choirs, stable zarzuela companies and orfeones.

The fan must not tolerate nostalgia. It is addictive, counterproductive and, above all, irreversible. The bad thing is that they rub the lamp and we are Aladdin. The Barcelona derby? A three-point game where the cliché of "the two rivals of the Diagonal" does not even apply, an imaginary border (the parakeets boasted of the upper area). When Sarrià flew, he would swear that the rivalry had gone to dust, so incorrect: it was about sticking his finger in the eye of the fan of the other team, who used to be, of course, a co-worker. What is lost with teleworking!

Nostalgia is not a mistake: it is a task that idols do for us when they leave.