Amber Barrett interview epitomizes why sports matter · The42

FOR the majority of people, watching elite sport is primarily escapism.

Like music or cinema, people often engage in it as a way to switch off from life’s problems and indulge in a fantasy world for an hour or two.

In a recent episode of The Ringer’s 22 Goals podcast, Brian Phillips used former Italy star Marco Tardelli’s famous celebration in the 1982 World Cup final as a vehicle to explore goal celebrations in general and what makes ordinary people identify so with certain professional athletes.

He explained: “I think what it comes down to is that we’re all trying, almost all the time, to figure out how to feel, what to think, how to interpret the world around us.

“Social media gives you the impression that most people are highly confident opinion machines who always know their own minds. But I don’t think most people are like that at all. I think most of us spend most of our lives feeling like we are in an ancient mound hidden deep in a dark forest, and there are no instructions to tell us where to go or what to do here, and we search some hint to help us avoid being eaten by grue.

“And celebrating a goal? That’s a clue. It’s a candle. It’s a guide to how to feel. Because of the sympathetic identification we feel with athletes, because of our openness to share their emotions, celebrating a goal makes the joy of the goal more complete. It allows us to perceive their happiness the same way we perceive their athleticism, the same way we perceive their grace.

“If that sounds like overthinking, well, I was born with this PhD inside of me, and this is when it came out. But a good goal celebration helps you bond with others during one of the sport’s pinnacle moments.

“It’s a bit outside the game, but it’s also at the heart of the game.

“It makes you—it makes us—less alone.”

In journalist and author Matt Dickison’s excellent recently published book Manchester United, the Treble and All That, he writes about the famous 1999 Champions League final where Manchester United scored two last-gasp goals to beat Bayern Munich.

The book interviews former Manchester United player Lou Macari, who commented on the final for Talk Radio.

Less than a month before the final, Macari’s youngest son Jonathan killed himself aged 19 after being released by Nottingham Forest the previous year.

Of the burst of joy he felt when the Red Devils scored their dramatic late winner, he explained: “For those two, three minutes, you got out of the tragedy you went through. You’re thinking about something else. People say you think about it every day, but you don’t, you can’t. You’re going to crack up, and that obviously has to happen to a lot of people who experience something like this. Their lives are torture.”

And on Tuesday night, during the greatest moment of her footballing life and the history of Irish women’s football, Amber Barrett had the humility to immediately think of others, and in particular those who have recently lost loved ones.

The striker knelt and pointed to his black armband seconds after scoring what proved to be the winning goal as the peak crowd of more than 600,000 collectively held their breath amid a nervy finish that eventually got Ireland over the line.

In her post-match interview with RTÉ afterwards, the Donegal native elaborated on her mixed emotions.

“I know Creeslough like the back of my hand. Both my grandparents were born and bred in Creeslough. I spent all my growing up there – summers and Christmases and every year I come back from playing football in Crieslaw.

“I know people who died in the tragedy, I know people who were affected by the tragedy. I know people who were first at the scene of the tragedy. I haven’t been able to put it into words these past few days.

“This is the best day of my life in terms of what we have done for football. When you put it in perspective, we’re not scratching the surface of what happened there on Friday.

“This result, this match, this goal, this award, I dedicate it to these 10 beautiful souls who unfortunately died on Friday. For all their families. Because I know they touched their lives. They certainly touched ours. This is for Creeslough. This is for Donegal.

Ireland and especially those affected by the Creaslow tragedy will never forget what happened that day.

A football score is meaningless in comparison.

But Barrett’s words and actions will surely bring some comfort to those directly affected, as well as serve as a strong reminder that they are not alone in their feelings of grief and sadness.

Even in the most euphoric moments, when it’s easy to get swept up in the ecstasy of the event, there can be an underlying sense of melancholy, a recognition of the preciousness of life and our own mortality. Perhaps because emotions are so heightened, it’s more common than normal to experience these conflicting thoughts.

And Barrett’s words ensured that, for a moment, hundreds of thousands of television viewers had exactly that feeling.

As the legendary Italian coach Arrigo Sacchi once said: “Football is the most important of the less important things in the world.”

Rarely has that famous phrase been more evident than on Tuesday night.

At its best, regardless of personal circumstances, sport can make anyone, everywhere, feel less alone, if only for a moment.