Daily Reading: Tuesday 21st May 2019

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/may/12/ecstasy-despair-and-how-the-great-game-reminded-us-of-the-ties-that-bind

NOTE: Please find a link to the full article above. I am unable to repost the whole article due to copyright restrictions. Below are extracts from the above article.

Ecstasy, despair and how the great game reminded us of the ties that bind

Kevin Sampson

In a week of wild drama, football took fans from helplessness to hope. Defying its tribalism, it also brought together huge swaths of the nation

Sun 12 May 2019 07.00 BSTLast modified on Sun 12 May 2019 10.32 BST

Eleven minutes into the second half, as Gini Wijnaldum’s header fizzed into the top corner and Liverpool took a 3-0 lead in their Champions League semi-final last week, I just stood there, motionless, staring at my mate Mick Potter with bulging eyes. He looked back, shaking his head. His dumbfounded expression said: “We’ve seen a lot, you and me – but nothing like this.”

I’ve known Mick since 1982. We have seen a lot together – Heysel, Hillsborough, dark, dark days as well as glorious times following our team. As with all friendships – your work, your family – your fate can draw you away, but there’s always that sinew that connects you. Our team; our history. The things we’ve done together, as supporters.

Earlier in the day, a bunch of us met up for a late lunch, something we always do before a European game. I don’t recall when this tradition started. There was never a conscious rationale to it, other than some vague idea that this was the “European thing” to do. Those first, formative trips to Bruges, to Zurich, Munich, Paris gave you a taste, literally, of the good stuff; an education.

This is what football can do to you; in the blink of an eye, it can transport you or destroy you. Spurs were the losers when everyone’s beloved underdogs, Leicester City, won the Premier League in 2016 – they know how those Ajax fans feel. Losing with the last kick of the game when you’re already planning your trip to the final – no worse, there is none.

I know we’re prone to self-mythologise; all the songs, the flags, the banners – we think we’re great and we want the world to know it. But we’re not alone: when were reticence and modesty any part of being a football fanatic? And when you have witnessed epic journeys, incredible comebacks, wins against all odds, why would you not stitch those memories into your own folklore?

Spurs fans will know all about that, too – the unreal hysteria of a historic win. The crazed, passionate embraces of dads and sons and daughters – mates, strangers, anyone within mauling distance. Players on their knees; manager sobbing unabashedly. After the Ajax crowd had the grace to applaud the game they’d just seen and left the stadium, shattered, the Spurs fans still stood there, in awe at what their team had just done – shaking their heads in stunned disbelief.

That was their history playing out, right there – the beautiful game at peak insanity. Whether it be north London, Liverpool or Leicester, these moments percolate over time to become our tales of yesteryear, our Euro lunches. Once you taste it, you just want more. It’s going to be some final.

Some discussion points:

Look at the headline – how do the headline and sub-heading show what the writer thinks about football?

·     Ecstasy, despair and how the great game reminded us of the ties that bind

·         In a week of wild drama, football took fans from helplessness to hope. Defying its tribalism, it also brought together huge swaths of the nation

A possible response:

The writer juxtaposes the abstract nouns “ecstasy”, meaning extreme happiness or elation and “despair” meaning extreme disappointment or loss of hope to illustrate the huge range of emotions that football causes people to feel. This message is emphasised again in the sub-heading in the personification, “football took fans from helplessness to hope.” The alliteration in “helplessness” and “hope” draws attention to the fact that these two emotions are opposites, showing that fans can expect to feel the full range of emotions in one day or even one match.

In both the headline and the sub-heading, the writer personifies football to show the power it has over its fans. In the headline, the statement, “the great game reminded us of the ties that bind,”  suggests that football has the power to unite people together. This is reiterated in the sub-heading, “it brought together huge swaths of the nation”. The mention of “defying tribalism” implies that it almost became irrelevant who the fans were supporting; they were all united by their love of football.

It is useful to notice that in an opinion article, it will be very clear from the headline what the article is about and the writer’s opinion – try to make sure that you do this in your own opinion articles.

Disclaimer: This is NOT (I repeat NOT) a model answer. This is simply a demonstration of the kind of language techniques you could be looking out for and the kinds of things you could begin thinking about. There are many, many other points that you could have made which would be equally valid.