To have and to have not

"Football teams are extraordinarily inventive in the ways they find to cause their supporters sorrow. They lead at Wembley and then throw it away; they go to the top of the First Division and then stop dead; they draw the difficult away game and lose the home replay; they beat Liverpool one week and lose to Scunthorpe the next; they seduce you, half-way through the season, into believing that they are promotion candidates and they go the other way...always, when you think you have anticipated the worst that can happen, they come up with something new."
Nick Hornby writing in Fever Pitch

I asked Aussie Matt, who will be at the match on Saturday, how he views it "For you, it's pretty much easy come, easy go, if we win great, if not...?" "Yeah, pretty much," he grinned, obviously still rejoicing over Australia's World Cup Qualification. I sigh, like I do with a student who doesn't get the assignment.
"Right." I should be like him, expect a win, enjoy the moment, if not, find other diversions. But I know that what I really want is so close that I can taste it and I close my eyes and I see it, a Latin-type stadium and street explosion, supporters
celebrating, cars honking horns and waving our manly pink colors, restaurant owners in Nagai pouring us free sake, then a all-singing subway ride and surface march to Minami, over the Dotonbori Bridge, victory pints at the Pig and Murphys, taking liberties with the local libertines all through the night.

And then it could all go wrong on Saturday, like a space shuttle burning up in the atmosphere and leaving blackened chunks of sizzling debris scattered across the landscape.

No mid-table mediocrity for us, it is either death or glory. Nagai Stadium sold out today and the clock is ticking.