Day -84
#WorldCup2018
(A special one)
There will no be asking of anybody to read between the lines. No
guessing what I'm going on about. Today will just be what I have to say
to mark, sadly, the most important event that happened today for me, and
my family.
My father passed away this morning, peacefully in his
sleep. His time had come. He was ready. We were also all prepared for
this happening. The distance makes it hard. Missing the one last goodbye
by about 36 hours made it harder.
John Mifsud loved his wife
of 48 years, who left us 6 years ago, and his 5 children, and was a
lover of football, golf and snooker (yes! It happened later in his
life). A big fan of Wolverhampton Wanderers and Sliema Wanderers he
taught me a lot about the one thing that bonded us the most: football.
The seed of excitement of Aston Villa winning the European Cup in 1982
and the joy of watching the World Cup of that year, was probably planted
on Tuesday evenings watching Big League Soccer with him. Me, him, my
brothers and Brian Moore.
He took me to my first live match:
Valletta-Hibs followed by Sliema against somebody. That's when I must
have known that sitting in a half empty stadium on a Sunday afternoon
was a something I wanted to do.
I'll forgive him now for not
coming home to pick me up for the violent Malta-Poland match in 1980. He
knew it would be chaotic. It was.
I won't argue anymore about
the numerous disallowed offside goals when I seemed to understand the
offisde rule more than him who had taught it to me.
I should have
apologised to him that I argued with him because I thought Gary Bailey
was the best goalkeeper in England because my "Match" magazine said so
after my Dad pointed out that he should have saved one of the goals in
the FA Cup Final. Was it 1983?
And I will smile now that I was in
my bed, falling asleep, as my brothers and Dad watched the infamous
1982 France-West Germany World Cup semifinal, me not being allowed to
stay up so late on a school night.
In 1986, again, I couldn't
watch the France-West Germany semifinal. I was too busy doing last
minute studying for my exams the next day. "If you don't know it by now,
you'll never know it," was his line. Then why not let me watch the
football?
1990 was probably the one we watched together the most.
Everyone else was gone. I was pre-University. Together we saw David
Platt's incredible extra time winner against Belgium and Gary Lineker's
game winning penalties against Cameroon.
USA '94 was our last one together. After that it was phone calls home to make score predictions for the finals.
Over the years he who took me to watch my first Maltese football match
told me not to bother with it as all results were pre-determined by who
had the most money.
He bemoaned the amount of foreign players in
England and all the money. He reminisced about the days of Billy Wright
and Sir Stanley Matthews. He moaned every time Cristiano Ronaldo fell
over. He taught me that Italians were divers and only knew how to
defend. He confused me by supporting England but repeatedly telling me
that they were terrible.
With distance our phone calls were when
we talked the most. He asked about Aston Villa. I told him how the
Wolves were doing, his interest waning a little as they fell from grace.
My siblings could fill him in on other things. I could tell him all he
needed to know about football.
I missed our football time
together. He never said he did, but I know he did. He never asked when I
was coming to visit, but his voice changed in tone to one of excitement
when I told him about a planned visit. And once in Malta all he wanted
to do was know if I was going to sit with him to watch "the match".
I'm sure he missed us all when we were away, but our success made him
happy. He was more than my football-watching partner. He worked hard,
very hard, so that we could all achieve what we did. His father worked
two jobs so that he could send his sons to the best school in Malta. He
passed that on to us.
School was important to him, more than
anything else he told us. He was tough with us. He bemoaned the fact
that I knew more about the TV football schedule than my school work. But
he always wanted nothing but the best for us. That was his way.
He grew up in a different time, had a very different childhood. His
family escaped wartime bombing. He had stories of bomb shelters and
moving away from his home to be away from the air raid bombings around
the harbour. He was at a boarding school in Malta, away from his
parents, when the only interaction was when his parents came to watch
them play football and threw sweets at them. His father must have been
extremely proud that his three sons grew up to a be a lawyer, doctor and
architect.
A couple of months ago, as he lay in his hospital
bed, he told us a story that made us all laugh. When he was a young man
in Malta you went to University to become a lawyer, doctor or architect.
Or you became a priest. But even though he had strong thoughts about
becoming a priest he couldn't because "priests weren't allowed to watch
football."
Now do you wonder where I got my passion from?
I'm off now. Off to Malta for another visit. No football to watch, but lots in my heart.
As much as I long for Aston Villa to be promoted this year, my bigger
wish is that the once great Wolves are back in the Premier League next
year. He would have been happy. I would have been so happy to call him
and tell him.
