Who knows?

My article from the Grecian Matchday Magazine for ECFC v Tamworth 29/10/2005

English philosopher Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) is quoted as having said: “Fear is the main source of superstition and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom." This seems a little extreme, as most superstitions these days are harmless. For example, they are very common among sports players and sports fans. Many people have certain routines they have to go through before a match or certain things they have to wear. Whether or not such things should matter, they clearly have an effect on the person involved. If the person is a player, a break in routine could affect their concentration during the game and therefore affect their performance.

This week the World Series of Baseball has been taking place in the USA between the Houston Astros and the Chicago White Sox. I’ve watched a bit of the series and the commentators made the odd reference to various superstitions of players. With this in mind I did a bit of digging on the Internet and found many sites claiming that baseball players are the most superstitious of all sportsmen or women.

When you look at some of the things baseball players have done in the past that claim is quite believable. Wade Boggs, for example, would eat chicken before every game. When you consider the baseball season lasts for over one hundred matches, that’s a lot of chicken. Turk Wendell, a pitcher, would brush his teeth between every inning. Presumably he was worried how his teeth would cope with the four liquorice sticks he would religiously chew while pitching.

Tennis players also tend to be quite superstitious. Goran Ivanisevic, the wonderfully unpredictable Croatian, is right up there with the quirkiest of them. If he won a match he would repeat everything he did that day before his next match. You can only imagine how dull a week he would have if he won a tournament. A common superstition amongst tennis players seems to be to avoid walking on the lines of the court. Belgian world number 6 Justine Henin-Hardenne, for example, lists this as her superstition, as does former world number 1 Martina Hingis.

I guess I’m a relatively superstitious person. I always salute a single magpie and try to avoid walking over three drains. Also, I no longer bet on City matches as I’m convinced that if I bet on a win, we’ll lose or draw no matter who we’re playing. And I clearly can’t bet on us to lose. This doesn’t stop me from participating in the GNET (an internet mailing list of City fans) prediction league and predicting City wins every week. As long as there’s no money involved, I feel safe.

Recently I’ve stopped wearing my City shirt to home matches because I realised that, when I wore it, we played poorly. This idea came to me after sitting on the train during the Cambridge home game a few weeks ago on the way back from holiday. That day, according to most reports, we played very well and I wasn’t wearing my shirt. The link seemed indisputable.

The fact that we lost to Stevenage last week when I wasn’t wearing my shirt may force me into a rethink. But that rethink certainly won’t result in me staying away from home games. It was just a coincidence that I wasn’t at that Cambridge game…