Sunday, May 18, 2008

It's not all about winning ...

Which is a bloody good thing if you support Swinton. An injury hit Swinton Lions took on in-form Oldham at Boundary Park today. It was a cracking match, the lead kept changing hands and with five minutes to go Swinton were two points up. A late try from a kick on the last tackle then gave Oldham the winning score and they added another in stoppage time to give them an extremely flattering 30-20 win. An Oldham fan turned round and said, "you were the better team".

And so I came out of the ground with the buzz you get from watching your side give a great performance against the odds. All very different from those who will only watch a winning side and treat every defeat as a catastrophe with deranged calls to local radio phone-ins demanding coach-sacking. They miss one of the great pleasures of sport; the occasional moment when the clouds of depression lift and hope shines through. Mind you, they also miss the near constant despair for the rest of the time. Do they have a point? No, not for me. Our day will come and until then I will settle for ecstasy about inspired defeat. It suits the English talent for misery.

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