Glastonbury mud man versus July 2, 2007

Glastonbury Man v Loch Ness man

Mankind is redeveloping himself at the Glastonbury Festival. That is why we are so attracted to it – we are seeing evolution in a known place and right before our eyes. In the mud. Mudman cometh.

I was kind of hoping I would see or even play in a mass game of football, at Glastonbury Festival. Large games had taken place before in the sunshine. Now there was too much mud for anyone to find a blade of grass to get a game together.

The portents had been good up at Rock Ness, on the bank of Loch Ness, a couple of weeks before. I made some friends during the second night of the Festival which was in truth the early morning and we wandered the site.

There behind the crew quarters, sitting very miserably were various guys who looked like they had come a long long way – indeed from overseas, and they were waiting around slighly disorientated as they were working in shifts, including in the middle of the night, clearing up after the natives. They were refugees, from African countries and from Eastern Europe.

Tara, a dancer from Orkney, Scotland, tried to get them to smile. It took a long while.

I helped when I asked them about ‘football’. Now they could talk and not just half-smile. Now they could find their feet.

Now it just so happened that after I had watched a decent band on stage called THE LAW and saw them again in the production area, leant against their tour bus, the manager with a toy football in hand, I asked them if they were looking for a proper game. Indeed they were. All would play save for the lead singer who had gone missing.

At this I knocked up the various “Refugees” I had met – some had taken to their tents in tiredness or boredom.

All we needed now was a ball. At that a proper leather ball appeared as if from nowhere. And we needed a pitch. Looking up we noticed a proper grassy pitch with goals and nets situated between the campsite and the edge of the Lake, but metres away.

So the Internationals as I called the refugees (Sierra Leone, Algeria, Congo, Sudan…and Yorkshire) took on THE LAW (manager, roadie, guitarist, guitarist, drummer). Me as a referee in the middle well placed for the occasional football photo and not foregetting Nessie should she pop her head up out of the water.

And what a game (5–3 to the Internationals against a very good Scottish team who supported Aberdeen, Aberdeen, Dundee, Dundee United and Celtic).

Back at Glastonbury, a biggish area cleared in the mud (during the musical tinkerings of Babyshambles) as a woman in purple ballgown readied to boot a ball. And with some skill, given the heavy conditions underfoot. Feet that could not be seen.

Time over a game threatened to erupt and this is a very good way to clear a crowd in the mud : prepare to kick a football.

A guy did throw himself full length to head the ball. The guy in brown with the brown eyes and brown hair and… brown smile.

Probably the man of the almost-match was that woman in the purple kit. She shall not be forgot.