He’s already making me ball. I signed him up for taekwondo, sailing, tennis, swimming, volleyball. Everything is fine for him, but he wants football. He’s wanted it ever since he learned to speak, and I’m against him. I won’t be able to take him to practice or a game on the weekends. Patiently, he tries the siege again as he conquers new areas of autonomy. Why would a mother who goes to trainings alone, asks for help from her family at matches, hates football like me, and does not separate Dembele from Mbappé, have to touch her? He constantly talks about the beautiful game and plays with a team he created according to the points he collected in the few hours I let him on the screen: “I have Maradona, I have Pelé, I have Messi, I have Gabi, I have Courtois…” When I say that some are dead and some are retiring early, he shows me all the trophies he has won with his unbeatable roster. He plays football in the hallway, on the street, in the schoolyard, his new shoes last a day and he reassures me he has a touch. Even older kids told him. He watches the games on TV and spends the summer wearing the uniform of one of his uncles and the hat of the other. He keeps me informed about the league going, points from Mallorca, news from Arsenal, Manchester City and PSG, including Alexia Putellas and Cata Coll. The fact that the Women’s World Cup is on a Sunday forced us to include the Spanish team’s match in our weekend schedule. In a bar surrounded by young girls, he claimed to be a football player, trembled and asked me for another opportunity to fulfill his dream next year.
But football is very difficult for me. And it embarrasses me because I’m surrounded by people who enjoy it with unwavering fidelity to their color. I envy them talking about such a game, such a signature, which coach so passionately; relationships from their hobbies; It rains or snows on his pilgrimage to the countryside. But I have reservations about introducing my daughter to her world and the values she spreads, and suddenly seeing myself on the podium, watching the rain of insults to the referee or the kid who missed the goal, rebutting the decisions of the person in charge. . What if I go crazy and start yelling at my opponent? But what if he’s not as good as he thinks and he’s so badly on the bench that he gets upset or if they kick him out as I know it happens often in kids’ sports in my city? Football and stuff like that. Football that is not from this planet and operates by its own rules. It has always seemed to me like a black hole of misogyny, racism, homophobia and dark economic interests. The last cave. He doesn’t fight, even by chance. I had to explain the insults to Vinicius to my daughter. It’s about the actors who are mocked by carrying bags to the wedding. And now about our champions. I told you as if it was over, what’s the point: A coach went too far with a player and everyone was so shocked that they fired him. That football has come down to the age we live in. The derogatory treatment of women’s sport needs to end. Those who run the Federation, like everyone else, need to respect the law and learn from it because they are ashamed. And the brave Jenni missed the penalty but scored a beautiful machismo goal.