Are Arsenal Ruining Your Life?

By Daniel Cowan
In Arsenal
May 3rd, 2014
5 Comments

Since my birthday in early April I’ve not been as active on social media and this blog as I usually am. You see, on my birthday, I was gifted the greatest present ever in the form of my first born child. The past 4 weeks have gone by in a whirlwind as I have adapted to life as a dad – although it kind of feels like my son has always been here – and I have found that many of my previous pleasures have had to take a back seat.

I no longer watch European football, play video games, go to the cinema, have marathon film box-set sessions at home, write about Arsenal as much as I would like or even sleep that much. My time is pretty much spent doing the other 50% of the chores my wife can no longer do as our almost 10lb (yikes) child spends most of her time feeding.

Where is he going with this I hear you ponder. Well, frankly, I’m not entirely sure, I just know that I’m tired. Like really tired. Don’t get me wrong, my son is actually an utter delight compared to other babies I know and he only cries (if you can class what he does as crying) for the breast or to be changed but I’m one of those people who finds it hard to sleep once woken.

I’m hard-wired to be doing something when awake and my mind goes from 0-60 in under 10 seconds so once woken, that’s it, I’m up for a good few hours. I also can’t sleep in the day time. Especially not when I know there is cleaning, washing, gardening, cooking and whatnot to do. Not to mention the fact I also work from home so I’m squeezing that in when I can. I’m often doing “chores” from 6am to 7pm with work crammed in between and lots of reading being done in the dead of night when the wife and child have settled back down after a feed and I am too wired to sleep.

Because of this hectic schedule, I have found my time spent on social media reduced by as much as 90% and it was my return to social media during and immediately after the Newcastle game that made me realise just how very tired I am.

The lack of sleep due to being a new parent is something I accepted long before my son was born but I never truly realised just how it affects every single part of your life as you struggle to form coherent sentences when talking to other adults or how you can put your wife’s delicates in the dryer despite repeating “don’t put them in the dryer” over and over like some sort of mantra or prayer to a brassiere wearing ethereal being.

But that is not the tired I am talking about. No, the tired I am is of the constant and unnecessary griping on social media towards players who are not at fault for being the only senior option in their position. It’s exhausting.

Maybe I was numbed to it when I was using social media regularly or maybe I’ve just been so happy for the past month I struggle to comprehend people allowing themselves to be so wound up.

The incident in question was Giroud’s double miss before Özil tucked away the rebound. Now I appreciate that Giroud is a very limited player and he’s not the striker most believe should be our first-choice – some are as extreme as thinking he isn’t good enough for the squad – and I understand that such misses have cost us dearly – or at least have cost us the chance to go ahead or be level in an important match – but the reaction was way over the top.

Instead of celebrating the fact we have scored a goal I saw a torrent of tweets all along the lines of “Giroud, you’re sh!t” “You’re so f*cking stupid, Giroud” “For f*cks sake Giroud!”, as well as many more extreme ones.

Seriously, what has to be so wrong in your life that your first reaction to a goal is to complain about the miss immediately before the goal?

I’m not saying these aren’t valid opinions or that people are not entitled to express them but as your first response? No, I don’t understand that. It’s like falling head first into a pool full of money and complaining about the twig you tripped over. And many more vulgar analogies I chose not to write down.

I know times have been tough (if you can call our self-entitled expectations not being met as tough) for Arsenal but you have to be one unhappy b*stard for your very first reaction to a goal to be a complaint about the miss that led to the rebound for the goal.

If you want to say “Great goal but Giroud really should have done better” then that’s fine because you are acknowledging the goal first. I imagine the people who complained about Giroud’s misses before celebrating the goal are the type of miserable sods who tell everyone they hate birthday’s and not to get them anything or throw a party and then complain that they didn’t even get a cake. Or hate children for being innocent. Or think some people are “just wrong” for being “too happy”. Or want smiling to be a prosecutable offence.

I can visualise them complaining about the Transformers movie for being unrealistic or start a petition for the extradition and incarceration of James Cameron for “commercialising a human tradegy”. Or spend all day complaining about the use of e-readers instead of real books because they “prefer the smell” but then lecture you on wasting paper and killing the environment.

It’s tiring just reading their diatribe. It must be utterly exhausting to hold on to so much hate that you cannot even muster the energy to celebrate a goal for the team you support.

If Arsenal are ruining your life that much and making you that unhappy then maybe you should consider stopping watching them because if you can’t summon the joy to make your first response to a goal for your team, in a winning position, to be of a celebratory nature then you should probably give up watching football because it really isn’t the game for you.

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About "" - 509 Posts

I am a South London born Gooner now living in Leigh-On-Sea, Essex. I'm a husband, daddy, podcaster, trainer enthusiast and aspiring author. My work is my passion and for that I will always be grateful. Here is where I write my thoughts and views on Arsenal Football Club, the greatest team the world has ever seen.

5 Responses to “Are Arsenal Ruining Your Life?”

  1. arsenal-steve says:

    I have four grandchildren and I love them to bits. It does not stop me recognising that Wenger, who was our saviour, is now our curse. We cannot win either the Premiership or European Championship with him at the helm, because football has developed and he has not.

    • Daniel Cowan says:

      I think you have missed the point. The post isn’t about having children or grandchildren. It’s about joyless robots who can’t even muster a cheer when we score.

    • arsenal-steve says:

      Daniel
      I am lucky that I can muster joy, happiness, and more. Life is more complex than you give credit for. It is possible to form an honest critique without being a ‘Robot’ and still to have joy coursing through body and mind. It’s nice when we score and disappointing to see Ground Hog day year after year. Giroud is a good player, not great, as you imply, but it will take more than a lone, ordinary, striker to ‘strike’ gold. I watch them, and have done since 1958, because I love the club…I no longer enjoy Arsene Wenger because I believe he has not changed although football generically has. Fantastic that you are a parent, I wish you all the joy in the world. Nothing better than loving your child. You will be a great Dad. I’m lucky now to have grandchildren. They teach us how to love.

    • Daniel Cowan says:

      I’m still not sure you get my point Steve – based on your responses. I’m not saying people can’t be happy about the goal and also think Giroud should have done better because I thought it myself. My point is there is seriously something wrong with a person if their first reaction to a goal – the very first reaction – is to complain about Giroud missing. I’m not saying it’s not a legitimate opinion, I am saying it is just plain weird for it to be your immediate response. First reaction to a goal should always be a version of “YES, we scored!” and then you can say “but really Giroud should have done better… we’ll never win the league with him etc etc etc” but the first reaction should always be of celebration for the goal. Always.

      I’m also a bit miffed that you are turning this into a Wenger debate but appreciate you leaving a comment nevertheless.

  2. Matin says:

    Totally get what you’re saying. Personally I look forward to every Arsenal game as it serves as a getaway from the horrible realities of the working world. Although I’m sure we do get pretty annoyed when players fail to do something that we expect them to do, as with Giroud’s case, I feel that for the 90 minutes when the 11 players don the red & white they deserve our full support. Any criticism of their performance should only be made post-game.

    Just cannot stand how some people react so negatively even when we score. Creates a very toxic atmosphere sometimes.

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