The Albatross

LI Bohemian kindly investigates the dark corridor that is supporting your team. We have all been there, I'm sure you'll hear echoes of your own experience here...

I never saw the home game against Saracens last Saturday. Firstly I had to work all day with just some music for company in a remote building in Oxfordshire. Secondly and more importantly, a pattern has emerged lately where if I watch or even listen to the game, Irish will lose or play badly. Now I know all about superstitious nonsense but superstitions have a habit of creeping up on you, before you know it, your saluting Magpies (I actually have never done this). I do not bother with the black cats, walking under ladders or any of the bad luck or good luck practices and yet when it comes to, when I played rugby and now a supporter of London Irish, the attitude to superstitious claptrap is somewhat lax.

The first time I intentionally did something that I thought would make me luckier was, as a player, before kick off I hit my little finger on the wall accidently. Although it ached it was not damaged, I taped it to the next finger just in case, in the game I scored two tries and from then on tape up fingers was a must. This was abandoned the following season and replaced with an equally ludicrous ritual, this carried on until I stopped playing.

The only game I have been able to attend this season was against Leicester at the BCS. I thoroughly enjoyed our new venue and the game was a tight affair that just got away from Irish in the last quarter of the match. For some reason I did not get to watch or follow the next two matches and was very surprised when I checked out the Exeter away result. I made a big effort to follow the next fixture which was the home game against Bristol Bears, which was not a win and so the pattern is was already starting to formulate subconsciously that implies - to support my team I have to ignore them.

I will soon choose a game to go to again in the near future and fingers crossed (I know) it will be a win and the pattern is broken but if Irish inexplicably lose a certain easy win game then you’ll know that it is the game this Albatross has attended.