How To Explain Hard Brexit And Welsh Independence.....Through The Medium Of Football

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

There I am on a Saturday night. The day spent on the packing and crating re the planned move on Friday. Time for a late night relax. Match of The Day is on BBC2 having been moved from its normal channel by the Eurovision Song Contest. A bit of an irony really given that you know the football results of the matches you're about to see beforehand but you also knew re the UK the result of the singing as well. But there we are.

West Ham are playing today (Sunday) but I saw Swansea City win (Hooray!) and Arsenal win (Boo! Indeed Boo! with added sprinkles)

As I was watching my mind began thinking about Eurovision and football and Europe and Hard Brexit....and if you want to know why......absolutely no idea whatsoever.

But you know football can explain the effect Hard Brexit is going to have on Britain. In 1985 due to the Heysel stadium disaster English teams were (rightly) banned from playing in European football competitions for five years. England were out, alone, isolated.

English football in that period was stagnant. They had to drum up meaningless competitions to make up for the matches lost (I seem to vaguely remember a Screensport...or was it Supersport (now defunct TV station) cup. Meanwhile the European competitions survived perfectly well without English teams thankyou very much.

And you could take it further. For English players to play in European competitions they transferred (emigrated) to Scotland (Terry Butcher - England team Captain or Chris Woods - England team goalkeeper) or France (Chris Waddle). They also wanted to experience the different culture as well. The media in England desperate to have an English involvement latched onto these players but it didn't hide the fact that isolation hurt England. It did not hurt Europe.

Let's also discuss immigration. When the ban was lifted foreign players started playing for English clubs. You can argue that it has badly affected the British game as a whole but without this immigration English football would not be as exciting as it is at the moment. Whilst it's obvious not every foreign player is as worth his/her fee British academy players can but only learn from the best if they're constantly watching them. Learning from the best would improve the British game. It's called education.

If football experiences a hard Brexit the lack of high quality foreign players will cause the British game to be the gloomy experience it was in the late eighties. It wont be pretty.

With regard to management if a nation is not opened to fresh ideas from wherever it comes from then it will be become dogmatic and authoritatian. Free thinking will frowned upon. Anything outside the established views will be considered "radical" and dangerous. This is happening in British politics right now.....or should I say far right now.

As for Welsh independence the performance of the national team in Euro 16 showed that if there is a will Wales can prove to a surprised world that it can survive,prosper and live without England. Despite whatever London based propaganda is broadcast to the contrary the Welsh are not stupid (though as I've argued before possibly too nice).

And remember this. Though Wales voted Brexit (good people being misled as I've discussed before) what Euro 16 showed was that the Welsh fans were well behaved and got on well with its neighbours unlike its English equivalents. If people could vote on this I'm sure that the Welsh would go for a soft Brexit so that there would be some link with Europe.

Wales moved together as a team through Euro 16. You'll say that the results since then have not been so good which is obviously true. I've also said before that independence will not result in mistakes never been made again. What independence gives is the purpose, a hoped for goal, in being involved in the rise of a reborn nation. Decisions will made in the context of improving the lives of Welsh people and the people who've moved here.

No one can argue people look at the Welsh football team with different eyes than it did before.

Until the next time.