First, find out which team your friends, partners or parents are supporting and make a point of cheering for the opposite team. This may seem a little hollow at first but if “your” team score, I promise that the joy of jumping around the living room laughing in a borderline maniacal manner a foot away from your friend’s disappointed face will not be lost on you, regardless of your disinterest in the outcome of the match. This can be particularly fun as, within the European championships, “your” team may end up being one such as Poland, in which case, you have the tantalising task of working Lewandowski and Błaszczykowski in to a song or chant of some kind.
Similarly, you could make a game of watching the football. This would work even better if there is someone else in the viewing party as disinterested in sport as yourself. Make bets with one another on what you think will happen in the next couple of minutes; cards, corners, players falling over etc. Put a small amount of money on these bets and witness yourself screaming at the television as those useless men in blue and white can’t quite conjure the heroics necessary to win you fifty pence. For the students and young at heart, it is exceedingly easy to turn watching football in to a drinking game. Have each non-interested spectator choose a team and then proceed to drink each time said team commits a foul, concedes a goal, gives the ball away or commits some other such folly. You will find that, as the drink begins to flow, the rules governing what requires forfeit become more and more obscure. “Your man just kicked the ball with his left foot, eight shots of sours.”
If none of these allow you to enjoy the football, just go to the pub when an England match is on. Yes, I know, this sounds like hell. But everyone in there is everyone else’s best friend, the camaraderie and atmosphere is contagious and most places have drink deals on whilst play is ongoing in order to draw in the punters. Try it, you might just get hooked.
