Football is meaningless and empty. A way to make pleasure from patterns and use it to partially fill the void. When it works, it works as a dream, a fiction, worth no more than we are willing to invest in it, and usually giving a paltry return. It makes as much sense as Dungeons and Dragons, synchronised swimming or organised religion. We know this, but still, we follow the moving ball and we hope. Occasionally a fairy tale plays out, one we can tell and re-tell. More time passed, more void filled.

No more. I’m not getting anything back any longer, and i’m done. In a fairy tale where one of the world’s best players wants to leave one of the world’s most successful clubs because their squad is not strong enough, there’s nothing left for me. When the dream of staying and fighting to make things better, to lead your team to win against the odds, is passed over in favour of joining a team that will never lose, it’s time to wake up and get on with our lives.

Leaving a top 3 club to join the top 1 club is more selfish than leaving for the money. What would you have done in 1940? Sailed to Dunkirk then joined the Axis Powers?

Football is no longer a game for dreamers, for lovers, for fighters. It’s a professional game for professional men who sometimes stand together and look like teams.

So fuck you, Wayne Rooney, for proving to us, once and for all, what we already knew but had hoped to forget. Enjoy your trophies. I’ll be outside, doing something else.