I THINK it’s fair to call my mother a lucky woman – and not just because she had me. While growing up in London, she survived The Blitz, spent decades doing a job she loved as a postwoman, raised three boys, has five adoring grandchildren plus a great-granddaughter, has always enjoyed good health, and is still going strong at nearly 93. All of which brings me to her love of football, and her potential for bringing the England team the luck they need to win a first major trophy since the World Cup win in 1966.
She’s a superstitious woman, not least when she’s watching football. She firmly believes that if Arsenal (her favourite club team), or the England national team, is winning, she has to keep as still as a statue. “If I move, the opposition always scores,” she says.
On the other hand, if Arsenal or England are losing, she has to switch off the telly for five minutes, and make a cup of tea. “When I switch back on, we’ve usually scored a goal,” she insists. Anyway, when she came over to our house for Sunday lunch at the weekend, she was telling us how she’d watched England play Switzerland in the quarter-finals of the Euros.
When Switzerland took the lead in the second half, she switched off the telly and made a cup of tea. When she switched it back on, Bukayo Saka had scored his spectacular equaliser for England. When it went to penalties, she became quite nervous, so she started nibbling on a packet of mini-biscuits that were on the coffee table next to.