Status anxiety

I know nothing about rugby, but Jonny Wilkinson is still my favourite quarterback

20 October 2007

Toby Young tries to mug up on rugby

You might well be wondering why I was flying 2,000 miles to watch a football match when I clearly know so little about the game. Indeed, why am I bothering to watch the rugby this Saturday? The answer is that in the past year or so I’ve suddenly developed a passionate interest in sport. After a lifetime of complete indifference, I now find myself devouring the Sports section of the Daily Telegraph each morning. It’s almost as if I’m suffering from one of those curious neurological disorders that Oliver Sacks writes about. My wife is convinced that this ‘personality change’ has been caused by the birth of our third child. In her eyes, my insistence on watching hour after hour of sport on TV is just an excuse to weasel out of my nappy-changing responsibilities.

At the conclusion of my conversation with Grub I was confident I’d be able to bluff my way through Saturday’s final.

‘When you get right down to it, Rugby League is no more complicated than Association Football,’ I said. Grub was unimpressed.

‘This is the Rugby Union World Cup, you plonker.’

Toby Young is associate editor of The Spectator.

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hannah

January 6th, 2008 1:54am Report this comment

hi this is hannah and can i ask you something will you be able to aks jonny wilkinson that i love him so much and i realley do wish that i was going out with jonny wilkinson love from hannh xxx

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