season

it was nice while it lasted.

two weeks of, mostly, good sports and sportsmanship. competitors taking their knocks and getting back up to play on without much fuss. competitors accepting their disqualifications and penalties with barely a word.

sure there were a few exceptions. a few drugs cheats, a couple of badminton doubles who were playing to the rules of the game and not the spirit of it (and who were dealt with harshly by the very administrators who put them in that position) and a fencer who thought she had been robbed.
for some their four year wait to be in the mass public consciousness ended in a blink of an eye and they have to wait another four years for another chance.

the olympics have come and gone.

now the football season is back overshadowing all.
it is the return of the petulant whiners, overpaid cheaters, the divers and complainers. rich spoilt footballers who may understand about the concept of fair play but have no idea who to put into practice. for them it is the gobbing and swearing.

for a few weeks the paralympics will remind us that people can play hard, very hard, and play fair and do it for the love of their sport rather than the reward it will bring.

but soon that will all be forgotten as we read, week in and week out, about the exploits of the premiership's star players. some of their antics will take place on the pitch, sometimes they will occur in public places other times it will be in the form of a sleazy kiss and tell story.

the olympics might have been the greatest show on earth, but we all know that the premiership is the only game in town.