Friday, November 24
'twas a time where the epl was shown on free-to-air, on a channel that used to be known as "premiere 12". subsequently though, the channel came to become known as "sportscity" (is it?) and the become the "central" today, minus the free football.
but before any epl, the first time i ever watched football was euro 96. hosted in england too, i'd remember, and the names of the various stadia, i remember, caught my eye.
"stamford bridge" wasn't one of those, to be honest. in fact chelsea were a pretty small club with a pretty small stadia, and thus i doubt it was used for any euro matches.
and it was on premiere 12 too, that i caught my first club game. wasn't an epl game, but a champions league game between arsenal and benfica. and then i remember the manyoo and arsenal game where giggs did that now-fabled slalom run and goal thing past the entire arsenal defence. a true moment of awakening, but for some reason i couldn't comprehend i could name the entire manyoo first team (schmeichel, pallister, cole etc.), but i never ever considered myself a fan. (thank heavens!)
and it was at a random shop in bedok central where i first realised that they actually sell those football jerseys! they were all fake, but i couldn't tell the difference in the past. manyoo's had "sharp viewcam" on the front, west ham's had "dagenham motors" and there, this blue jersey with the "cools" caught my eye.
i had got my mum to buy me that blue thing, without even actually knowing what team it was. does sound subverted doesn't it.
and the rest, as they say, is history.