When soccer becomes 'more' than a game.

Several of you already know about the 'incident' at Wednesdays soccer match so please feel free to amuse yourselves while I regale those unfortunates who have not yet heard the tale.

First of all I think you all need to know something very important about my husband, Christian.
Christian is a very non-violent person. He swears like a pirate, his sarcasm cuts to the bone, he watches action films and plays all sorts of nasty games on his wii and PS2 but when it comes to physical violence he's just not into it. It's also very rare for Christian to lose his temper.

So anyway, Christian still can't play soccer at the moment as his ankle just isn't fully recovered, we've still been going to the games however as we want to support the team. So on Wednesday we went round to Sexy Mike's place first so the boys could play Magic (I helped Tiho and we lost horribly so perhaps my aspirations to become a kick arse Magic player are a little deluded, but I digress) and then we headed off to watch the game with Kat. The boys were playing a team called Nothing Suss and I would like to point out here at the onset that there was a lot of things suss about them.

So, the opposition score two early goals but despite this they yell and swear at each other and get rather aggro all round. The boys score two goals and then we're even. Then we get called by the ref for not throwing in from the sides correctly. The ball has to be thrown in from behind the head, not released when it's over of in front of you. Fair enough but then the other team do it and don't get called.
So Christian (who has become a rather vocal spectator) calls at the ref 'So, how is that any different???'. This guy from the other team stops and yells out at Christian, the conversation going something like this.

Loser : 'Do you need your prescription checked mate?'
Christian : 'Come on, there was no way that ball was thrown from behind'
L : 'You've got no fucking idea mate'
C : Yeah, maybe if you're head was this big it might have been ok' (Christian holds his hands out a foot or two)
L : (grabs crotch) Well what do you think of this then?
C : I think I'd need a prescription to see that!
L : Oh you're so gonna fucking cop it after that
C : Whatever mate, it's just a game
L : Nah, you're fucking dead. Ref, sub!

So Loser then proceeds to march off the court and come yelling at Christian about how he's going to beat Christian's head in. Stupidly (it seemed like such a good idea at the time) I step in front of this guy and say 'Look, just calm down mate'.
Now, this guy wasn't going to calm down. Quite the opposite in fact. I honestly thought then he was going to punch me. Obviously so did Christian because when Loser yells out 'So, you gonna hide behind your fucking woman???' Christian then went 'Fine, you want to have a go at me?'

So Loser goes for Christian and we all thought (Christian, Kat and I) that this guy was going to throw a punch. Instead he takes a running kick right at my husbands family jewels.
Well, that did it.
Christian starts grappling with him and this guy just goes beserk, punches Christian in the face and pretty much body slams him onto the ground. I jump on top, trying to pull this guy off and one of his team mates comes running and tries to help. Meanwhile this guy can't really do much except squish Christian (he was much taller and much, much heavier than Christian) and Christian, after discovering this guy doesn't flinch to being punched in the head then starts gouging out his eyes with his thumbs. On the court our keeper Enzo notices something's amiss and jumps over to help, bringing half of our team and half the other team with him.
In the end it takes four guys to pull Loser off Christian and drag him away, and within a minute this guys is all like 'I'm so sorry, it's my fault, I overreacted and I shouldn't have lost it'.

The court is in an uproar, everyone is yelling at the ref (who did diddly fucking squat the whole time), the manager on duty of Loftus comes down and takes this guy away to do up a report, Loser keeps apologising and my heart is beating six hundred times a minute. Kat and I are in complete shock that this guy just lost it so completely and Christian is spewing his glasses have been twisted (and although he didn't show it at the time, his balls must have been killing him).

Eventually the game resumes and we sit in silence for quite a while. Loser comes back down to the court, again saying how sorry he is. Christian doesn't want a bar of it and retorts 'Yeah, well try telling my nuts that'.
The game ends and at some point Mike scored a goal without us realising it and so we've won the game. As Enzo put it 'We weren't going to let them win after that.'

As they're leaving, the other team each walk up and apologise to us and the manager comes down to inform us that Loser has been banned, although we don't know how long for. We discover Christian is bleeding from several carpet burns but he manages to bend his glasses back into shape. We stood about in the carpark for a bit afterwards chatting and then headed home, but it took me a long time to fall asleep that night. I don't think my heart stopped pounding until about four in the morning.

And so Christian's first punch up will echo on down through the ages, immortalised by Blogger. He probably won't ever read this (actually I know he won't, no matter how much I nag him to) but I'll say this anyway.
Christian, I salute you. Also, I hope your left testicle will finally decided to work it's way down from behind your left ear sometime before Christmas.