ONE WEIRD WEEKEND By Touch the Light I like football. But seriously...

I like football.

I like the way the game flows. I like the passionate intensity so many of the supporters show. I like seeing a goal in the very first minute and not knowing if that’ll be the final score or it’s going to end up 7-3. I like it that teams of no-hopers such as Swansea City can become established Premier League outfits, and I have to admit that I take a perverse pleasure in watching some sides move in the opposite direction.

But tonight I’m wondering if the game hasn’t changed so much I’d be better off following some other sport. Cheese rolling, maybe.

It’s already been a difficult season for me. I support three clubs: Sunderland, which is where I choose to live; Hartlepool United, from my home town; and Portsmouth, the city where I spent my formative years and which will always have a special place in my heart.

At the time of writing there’s a very real possibility — many pundits would say a near certainty — that all three will be relegated from their respective divisions this year.

I have no problem with that. Shit happens. What does success really mean if there’s no chance of failure?

Yet today I’ve learned that Sunderland have sacked manager Martin O’Neill and appointed as his replacement the former Italian international Paolo di Canio. As a result David Milliband, brother of opposition Labour Party leader Ed Milliband, has severed his connections with the club owing to di Canio’s ‘fascist’ leanings, including his admiration for Benito Mussolini.

This was news to me. I’d always admired di Canio. Okay, he once pushed a referee to the ground after being sent off but the same guy demonstrated a unique degree of sportsmanship when in one game he had the opportunity to score but caught the ball because he’d noticed that the goalkeeper was injured and demanded that the game be stopped so he could receive treatment.

But I can’t abide right-wing views. They make me sick to the stomach. If di Canio really holds some of the opinions I’ve seen mentioned on the blogs I’ve been reading tonight then I hope he fails — big time.

Sunderland is a pretty depressed place. But its people are wonderful. There’s an undercurrent of racism here, but it’s the kind I grew up with, a benign hangover from the days of Empire. ‘Made In Britain’ and all that. (This is not to excuse it, by the way!)

What the city doesn’t need is a flamboyant character shouting his mouth off and by doing so making its image worse than it already is.

Thank you for your time.

Richard Furness