{"id":244883,"date":"2025-07-07T09:14:09","date_gmt":"2025-07-07T09:14:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/244883\/"},"modified":"2025-07-07T09:14:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-07T09:14:09","slug":"diogo-jota-death-teaches-us-to-leave-everything-on-the-pitch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/244883\/","title":{"rendered":"Diogo Jota death teaches us to leave everything on the pitch"},"content":{"rendered":"

I know I\u2019m not unique in being taken to some upsetting and emotional places by the death of Diogo Jota.<\/p>\n

We football obsessives process much about life generally through its prism. It\u2019s always with us.<\/p>\n

This week we can crawl back under its comfort blanket as the Champions League qualifiers start and the Scottish League Cup begins on the 12th. And that adds to the Euros which run for July, and the gold-plated toilet that is the Club World Cup. The EFL begins in the first week in August and we\u2019re off again.<\/p>\n

Is it any wonder we\u2019re so emotionally and practically engaged with it and its players? That\u2019s why Jota\u2019s accident was felt so deeply. You have the players in your set in your mind as actors in the forthcoming drama and abruptly they\u2019ve gone. And that\u2019s not even as a Liverpool fan.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s so shocking when someone you\u2019re familiar with, even a footballer who you somehow feel you know, passes away tragically.<\/p>\n

I have to tell you, it doesn\u2019t get any easier with the passing years, worse if anything. So I should be used to it by now. But it still seemed so terrible, unbelievably so.<\/p>\n

When you get to my age, cultural and sporting heroes die at a regular alarming rate. I doubt I have ever cried as much as when George Best died. So much of my young life was tied up with Bestie and I wept for my childhood as much as for him.<\/p>\n

People say it doesn\u2019t make sense but what sense could it properly make? There is no meritocracy to existence. Being great at football doesn\u2019t grant you a long life or a short life or\u2026well, anything. It doesn\u2019t help to know there is no logic or reason.<\/p>\n

READ: Some should hang their heads in shame over the reporting on Diogo Jota tragedy<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Any of us, at any time, could throw a seven and that\u2019s that. You can\u2019t go around fearing it so we swallow it down. \u2018Not now, not now\u2019, we tell ourselves. And it mostly isn\u2019t, of course, at least until it is. That bloke in America who is trying to live forever has lost grip; this isn\u2019t a game we can ever win.<\/p>\n

As a species we seem at ease with thousands of souls dying in floods or from a rocket up the backside in the pursuit of some dubious cause, but if they are culturally significant to us, like footballers, it feels especially senseless and emotional. But we\u2019re all the same. We cry the same tears, our souls are all twisted in the anguish and joy of existence.<\/p>\n

When I had my stroke it was 5am on a Sunday morning. I don\u2019t remember a lot of it, just a few glimpses. I recall it was the frostiest, coldest night of the year and all that guff about being \u2018a fighter\u2019 was proven irrelevant. I gave up my existence just like that, in a heartbeat, retreating into the little voice in my head and then nothing. I did briefly emerge into consciousness as a catheter was put in me and I thought I was on an alien spaceship, having my seed drained. It\u2019s okay. You\u2019re welcome, I can spare it. But it has taught me something.<\/p>\n

Other people\u2019s skill and kindness saved me and if I\u2019d ever doubted that we are not islands unto ourselves, that proved it.<\/p>\n

As the good wishes flooded in, though I was barely compos mentis and unable to even speak, the warmth of that humane energy fed my soul. As comparatively disabled as I am now, you learn to appreciate and celebrate everything. It happened to me for \u2018no known reason\u2019 according to the diagnosis. It wasn\u2019t too many pies, too little exercise, too much Glen\u2019s vodka. No reason. Probably a genetic inheritance. Though perhaps God is punishing me for listening to too much jazz-rock.<\/p>\n

Ironically, I\u2019m happier now, because when you\u2019ve been to the edge, you take nothing for granted. It\u2019s sh*t of course but happiness and consciousness is in the mind, not the legs or arms.<\/p>\n

Of course you can\u2019t appreciate a footballer like Jota just in case they die an early death. You can\u2019t live like that, but an appreciation of the fragility of life should always be factored into our responses. I know I\u2019ve been made to confront it all and life is better for it. Warren Zevon, a musician who lived a wild life in the hedonistic LA of the 70s and 80s, died of an incurable cancer. His advice? \u2018Enjoy every sandwich.\u2019 And that\u2019s right, both literally and metaphorically.<\/p>\n

His death has made me confront these issues. As someone pointed out, it doesn\u2019t put everything in perspective<\/strong><\/a>. If anything it shows how deeply football eats into our lives and brings us together. But perhaps it should make you appreciate everything and everyone you love in every moment. Wake up from your slumbers of immortality and assumptions that this is forever and there\u2019ll always be more, because at some point, there won\u2019t be.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t take anything for granted, not a thing. It\u2019s all just a phase, everything and everyone comes and goes at some point. It hurts and upsets but there\u2019s nothing we can do. It is our lot.<\/p>\n

Football teaches us to leave it all out on the pitch. Don\u2019t let anything be unsaid because, as far as we know, we only get one go at this, so live every day as if it\u2019s a cup final.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I know I\u2019m not unique in being taken to some upsetting and emotional places by the death of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":244884,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8815],"tags":[748,393,163,4884,225,83215,179,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-244883","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-liverpool","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-england","10":"tag-front-page","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-home-page","13":"tag-johnny-nic","14":"tag-liverpool","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114811192158957931","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244883\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/244884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}