Up the Brits! Up the English! Up the EU?

This appeared in the Bath Chronicle on Thursday, February 10

Last week as I got ready to watch the annual war we call “The England versus Wales rugby fixture” I had another attack of my national identity crisis.

As I watched the build-up and saw the Welsh team and fans steadily getting themselves into a frenzy about facing the “old enemy”, I suddenly asked myself “hey, aren’t; these my fellow compatriots?”

For no, I am not Welsh – but I am British and yet here were my fellow Brits choking back the tears at the thought of trying to batter us, their fellow Britons. For yes, we are forced at events like this to ask ourselves once again – are we British or are we nglish/Scottish/Welsh/Northern Irish? And the answer appears to be – whatever suits us at the time.

As a rather naughty example, I am afraid I have a terrible problem with “our” tennis hero Andy Murray. Try as I might I just can’t find anything about the guy that inspires me to, err, like him. I don’t know what it is – perhaps it’s his charmless arrogance, the way that in the final of the Australian Open he looked as though he had thrown on his scruffy five-a-side football kit instead of a decent tennis outfit, or the fact that when he smiles it looks like an ironic gesture – but he just seems as warm and loveable as six-day-old Ready Brek. And yet he is a “Brit” so I should support him, yes? Well , up to a very simple point. As my colleagues have heard all too often (my sports editor even had a ‘sweep’ about how long it would take me to mention it when he lost the last final) when Andy Murray wins he is “Britain’s Andy Murray”. And when he loses he is “Scotland’s Andy Murray”. Silly, I know but I can’t help it. I mean, would it kill him to smile?

My national identity confusion isn’t helped by the fact that at times “our” team wears the red and white flag and at others it’s the Union Jack. Thus my English pride is very strong in sports such as football, rugby and cricket where “my” team is called England and comes all wrapped up with motifs of bulldogs, roses and lions. (Incidentally, all that “three lions on a shirt” stuff – why on earth does an African lion represent the land of my (English) fathers? Does the Tanzania footy team have a grey squirrel on its tops? I think not).

And yet, come the Olympic Games, my English flag goes back in the drawer and out comes the Union Jack. In that event, I don’t care if the athlete is from Belfast, Birmingham, Cardiff or Clyde – I love them all equally. For they are Brits representing Britain. And I am Brit cheering on Britain – England no longer matters.

But of course it doesn’t end there. Every two years even the most fierce UKIP-ite can suddenly becomes pro-European when our continent takes on the USA at the Ryder Cup. The Union Jack goes out of the window and it is bonjour to the blue European one. Our allegiance is changed again.

Ah well, let us just hope one day we can discover intelligent life on another planet and we can all join forces to support a World Team.

I’d still probably back an alien against Andy Murray though.

Reasons to be cheerful - 1,2 ,3

This is an edited down version of my column from the Bath Chronicle printed on January 8.

I don't know about but I am getting fed up reading all the doom and gloom that is out there at the moment. I am a generally pretty positive 'half glass full' kinda guy so I wanted to try and look on the bright side of life today and find reasons to be cheerful for 2009.

But trust me - it ain't easy.

Every day our newspapers and televisions give us more and more gloomy economic news about the demise of everything from big banks and those crucial high street chain stores to small independent businesses.

What probably makes things worse is that we have all just finished a festive period where we still probably spent too much money and where we encountered friends and family from all over the country who had similar tales of woe about the economy in their patches.

I don’t know many people who feel 100 per cent secure in their employment at the moment and it has come to the point where the only person in Britain with a guaranteed job for life is the Queen. (Pictured here visiting Bath a few years back)


So, amid all this doom and gloom, what can we actually look forward to in 2009?

Here are just 'three reasons to be cheerful' (thanks for the phrase Mr Ian Drury!) but I truly hope you have plenty more of your own...

• Barack Obama. In some ways it seems ages ago when he won the right to be the next President but in less than two weeks that is exactly what he will become. So cast your minds back to the general sense of elation and optimism his election created and it may help to get you through the next few weeks. True, he may have the ‘inbox from hell’ when he takes over, but he has the goodwill of a large chunk of the world’s population and that has to count for something. And one other reason to be cheerful about Obama? It will mean no more of George Walker Bush.


• The weather. This may seem bizarre as we are all currently freezing our wot-nots off, but advanced forecasts have indicated we could be having a serious heatwave in the summer. This is good news on two counts. First, we haven’t had a good summer for a number of years but second, the rocketing price of European holidays due to the falling pound means that more people will be holidaying in the UK this year and it is nice to know they might be able to take sun cream rather than Kagools to the beach. If more people are staying in the UK, that can only mean good news for a tourist spot like Bath, which should benefit economically as a result.


• Sport. There is no denying a bit of sporting success can raise the most fallen of spirits. Although we don’t have the Olympics this year, we do have an entirely winnable Ashes series (despite the shenanigans this week) and there is a lot of evidence to say that even though he is about as miserable as the economy, Andy Murray might finally break our Wimbledon duck. Oh, and under Mr Capello, expect even greater things from England’s football side, too...

OK, I accept that having a new American President, better weather and the chance of seeing a dour Scot as a tennis champion might hardly balance the bleak world scenario, but at least I’m trying.

2009 can only be the year from hell if we let it!