Chancing upon the Twitter exchange above the other day couldn’t help but send a frisson of anxiety pulsing through my synapses. A feeling akin to seeing a significant other surreptitiously flirting with Chad from Marketing at the annual office Pot Luck.
But, always wanting to be the adult in the room, I didn’t waste my time on pointless angst and idle imaginings. I simply called the Whitecaps directly to clarify the situation. And, for the benefit of posterity, I have transcribed the details of the call below.
ME: Hi.
VW: Hi.
Me: Just wanted to check how the flight went and that you’re settling in in Utah.
VW: Thanks so much! Yes all good so far.
ME: Good to know. I see you’ve started to make friends with the locals.
VW: What?
ME: I saw the tweets between you and a Salt Lake fan and I think it’s good that you’ve wasted absolutely no time in making new friends.
VW: …….
ME: Still there?
VW: Is that what this call is about?
ME: What do you mean?
VW: Are you calling to check up on us?
ME: Of course not!
VW: Because we really can’t do this right now.
ME: Do what?
VW: This.
ME: …..
VW: You know how hard it was for us in Florida last year right? Isolated and away from everybody.
ME: Of course I do. And I supported you through that.
VW: Sure you did.
ME: What does that mean?
VW: It means that sarcastic tweets and passive aggressive blog posts don’t always come across as supportive.
ME: Passive aggressive?
VW: Yes. Passive aggressive.
ME: Well, I don’t know about passive aggressive, but I wish your passing was more aggressive. You might score more goals.
VW: There we go! You always have to bring it back to the passing don’t you? Every time!
ME: It’s important! Anyway, it’s not just the passing. It’s the getting people into the box as well. I mention that a lot too.
VW: We noticed.
ME: I’m trying to help.
VW: But it doesn’t help. How do you think it makes us feel?
ME: Well, I’m not sure but..
VW: And we know that you watch Premier League and Champions League games when we’re not around.
ME: Everybody does that!
VW: Exactly. You’re just like all the rest. Sometimes it feels as though you don’t support us for who we are, but for who you want us to be. And we just can’t be that team. We’ll never be that team.
ME: Well, I didn’t mean to upset you and….
VW Look, we’re tired. We’ve got a lot going on. And I think it will be good for us to spend some time away from you. Just so that we can re-focus and get ourselves together again.
ME: But you’re coming back right?
VW: Of course we’re coming back! Why do you have to be so suspicious all the time?
ME: Well I’ve heard stories about teams going to other cities and never coming back. So I’m worried.
VW: We’re coming back. We just need space to ourselves to figure some things out.
ME: Okay if that’s how you feel. Should I call you again?
VW: We’d prefer it if you didn’t.
ME: I’ll write though.
VW: You don’t have to.
ME: No, I really don’t mind. I’ll write after every game and let you know what I thought of it. That way you’ll know all the things you’ve been doing wrong and that will help you to……hello? Hello?
At that stage the line went dead. Probably symptomatic of the poor infrastructure that America is blighted with after decades of under investment.
Safe to say though that I helped to ease the situation and put everybody’s minds at ease.
Soccer Shorts (The Director's Cut) 