Endurance

I'm sure many people remember the Japanese game show Endurance, introduced to Britain by the estimable Clive James if I'm not mistaken. For those who don't, the premise was that contestants would endure an increasingly testing and unpleasant series of trials of their ability to take pain, discomfort, embarrassment, etc, slowly eliminating the quitters until one ultimate masochist, sorry, winner, remained.

Well - we now have the World Cup for our own version of said show. "Think Algeria was horrible? Have some of this then, against Slovenia. Got through Slovenia? Ah, congratulations - you've won the 'beating your own head with a hammer in the deadly scorpion pit' round, then. You've earned the right to swim 1000 lengths in our shark-infested pool. It's just over there, through the room of rabid dogs, down the corridor of upturned scalpel blades..."

I've often pondered on why there's no single word for schadenfreude in English, we've had to pinch the Germans' own term. Well, it occurs to me that, if it's got anything at all to do with football, it's because we're so busy making life as absolutely unbearable for ourselves as possible that it doesn't even occur to us to enjoy the misfortune of others. The Germans, on the other hand, have had ample opportunity to laugh at other teams' pathetic, scrambling efforts to stay in the competition as they've moved effortlessly through to one of their six finals, pausing only to take in the views and wonder what the countries who are rubbish at penalties are up to, and have therefore come up with a term that best describes this feeling of enjoyment at others' discomfort.

I have, during the course of Friday's game and today's, literally bitten my fingers 'til they've bled. The way England are making us suffer, it'll go to extra time and pens again on Sunday, and I'll eventually stop gnawing at a bloodied stump somewhere between elbow and shoulder.

Well played though, lads. The fans got behind you as predicted and, though my poor punished heart may not be too pleased, we can 'look forward' to another doubtless fraught encounter with our old pals, and more torment. I wonder if Clive James is having a quiet chuckle at the whole thing. He's missed a trick, thinking about it. He could be fronting a programme on Japanese TV showing highlights of terrified groups of England fans going through hell watching the games on telly, only to gather for an even worse experience a few days later. They'd probably empathise over there.