Football.

When I was a kid I used to go out on the knocker collecting old scrap iron and rags. My mam would work one side of the street and me the other

Mostly we worked terraced houses, they had a front door on the pavement, and a passage leading to the back door. One passage was shared by four houses

Sheffield United's ground at Bramhall Lane was right in the middle of a densely packed patch of terraced houses that we worked about once a month.

Sometimes, our day would clash with match day and then the usually quiet streets would fill with loud, boisterous, scary fans making their way to the ground.

I used to lurk halfway down a passage, waiting for a gap in the crowd so that I could run out on to the street and bolt down the next passage before they saw me.

If I did get caught it was usually while carrying a bit of scrap or a bundle of rags back to the lorry. On these occasions nothing serious ever happened to me, they would just have a bit of fun at my expense, perhaps take some of my stuff and pass it around before eventually giving it back.

Looking back it was all just lads in high spirits having a laugh but I hated it.

My grandad, who I idolised was scathingly disparaging about football. "Bloody Hell!" (That was as sweary as he ever got) "Have grown men nothing better to do than chase a bladder of wind across a field?"

During my youth the news was awash with stories of football violence and hooliganism. So called fans smashing up stadiums before running riot through the streets, leaving injury and destruction, sometimes even death in their wake.

So I suppose I just took against football.

Sure I would watch the big matches, world cup, FA final etc, but never with any real interest or passion.

Even on here the football threads used to infuriate me. I used to try to get interested just to fit in, but really I felt like knocking people's heads together.

When Sheffield utd got promoted last year I started to take an interest, then while out on my bike one day I stopped at a biker café on the A1 for a bacon butty and got chatting to some Sheffield fans.

It was great. They were immensely knowledgeable and I contributed very little to the conversation but they made me feel like we had been friends for years, it was great.

Since then I've read loads of football related stuff. Hand of God, Gary craps himself on the pitch, Beckham metatarsal meyhem, triumphs and disasters galore. Amazing stories that are all old hat to everyone except me.

I'll never catch up with you. You who have football as part of your life. You who have celebrated and dispared, congratulated and condemned, lived and died with your teams.

I'll never catch up, but I get it now.