Wednesday, April 5, 2006

Fan following

April 04 - UEFA Champion's League Quarterfinal Second Leg at San Siro - AC Milan's Inzaghi scored againt run of play to lead the leg 1-0 but Lyon's Diarra scored back in next 5 minutes to make it level and I was happy for this equalizer. Suddenly realizing that AC Milan is the team that has been my favorite since childhood. I've been longing to wear its red-black t-shirt and how happy I was when I saw the San Siro. But here, I was supporting the rivals. What had happened to me.

Was I moving from a straight fan follower to take a more generalistic approach of following better football? Or, I was just supporting another team that had no stars and thus was a weaker side, what if they were French Champions by far or what if they dominated the game for 85minutes and were few minutes away from creating club history of reaching semi-final stage.

This beautiful game raised many more questions about this fan following. How was I different from all sitting in San Siro and making a deafening noise for Forza Milan or Forza San Siro? How could anyone support Chelsea life long? Ok they might be champions, then how could anyone follow and support Sunderland when i guess 99% know they will relegate themselves or be close to it in Premiership? Moving to a different sport, how could anyone get behind Scuderia Toro Rosso, when we are sure they might still not get points if all other cars crash out in Formula One?

These and many more questions that neurons raised in something we call as mind, have been troubling me and i would like to find answers and give arguments and contradict a few times, to find some concrete answers to such questions raised by fan following.