Staying in the same general ballpark, I will offer you another kind of test. What is it, do you think, that 'fosters the worst excesses of humankind'? Have a guess before I tell you. Dictatorship? Civil war? Racial and ethnic hatreds?
For Alan Hubbard it's none of those. It's football. If that leads you to think that the article in which he says this is just a tad one-sided, you'll be right. It's all about the horrors and woes of the present game. According to Hubbard, these make it too ugly for the description 'the beautiful game' to remain apt.
I don't mean to make light of racism in football, bad sportsmanship, cheating, vile chants and the rest. But to see these things in sensible proportion, one needs to balance what is wrong in football with some of what is right about it. Football, Hubbard says, 'attracts society's dregs'. It also attracts - worldwide - millions and millions of others. This is because set against 'the dismay among those who, like [him], once cherished the game' there are very large numbers of people who continue to get interest and excitement and beauty and joy from it. It's unlikely that would still be happening if the game hadn't retained some of its intrinsic attractions and virtues.
