Farage's Football Fantasy

What Nigel Farage's new-found 'love' of football tells us about his suitability for high office.

Having previously demanded politics stay out of football, Nigel Farage has launched his own partisan kit, again exposing his authoritarian fantasies in the process.

Two weekends ago, as many of us were putting our feet up to enjoy the start of the new football season, Nigel Farage was busy launching his 'Reform FC' football shirts.

This seemed especially odd to me because Farage has never been one to profess his love for football. Once or twice, he has mentioned his support for Crystal Palace, but he never seems to go to any matches, nor does he seems to know much at all about the club. I suppose we should not really be surprised: there’s not much about a racially diverse, multi-national football team captained by a man who moved to South London from the Ivory Coast at the age of one that would chime with Farage’s core values.

We all know that Farage's political career has never been overburdened by consistency or a desire to stick to any particular principles. But last Sunday's football shirt launch represents one of the most brazen examples yet of his tendency to abandon principles in pursuit of the attention and financial rewards he constantly craves. Not only is he not really a football fan, he's the man who has demanded - on more than one occasion - that politics be kept out of football.

In 2021, after England players announced they would 'take the knee' at the European Championships as an anti-racism gesture, Farage tweeted that we should "keep politics out of football." But the country at large didn’t share his sentiment and got fully behind the team and THEIR principles. Then, in England’s final game, when three black players missed penalties, they suffered appalling racial abuse online, demonstrating with crystal clarity why the gesture was needed and how out of touch the self-styled ‘man of the people’ was.

Fast forward to the Euros in 2024 - taking place alongside the general election campaign - and Farage announced he would not wear the new England shirt because it featured a small multicoloured St. George's Cross on the back of the collar. He went so far as to label the England players "gutless" for not protesting this departure from the flag’s traditional design. But, again, ordinary people were not with him and Farage’s self-serving hullabaloo was soon forgotten.

Now, barely a year later, Farage is flogging party political football merchandise, in a cynical attempt to steal for himself some of the love British working-class men in particular have for the beautiful game.

But the farce doesn’t end there. The back of ALL these shirts feature ‘Farage’ and the number 10. As with his leadership of the party, there is no way for his supporters to change that. If ever anything demonstrated his true narcissism, and the most establishment ambitions of this claimed anti-establishment hero, there it is right in front of you.

All this perfectly exposes the hollow nature of Farage’s previous outrage and his utter unfitness for the demands of high political office. When it suited his agenda to wage a culture war, any political influence on football was worthy of total condemnation, even to the point of attacking the nation’s sporting heroes. But now it could serve his electoral interests - and put a few more quid in his already swollen bank account - Farage shifts, snakelike, to present it as a perfectly reasonable state of affairs.

It will not have escaped you that this 'Farage 10' shirt branding is an attempt to create his own version of the ‘MAGA’ hat so beloved of his best buddy, Donald Trump. He has seen the power that hat has in reinforcing a personality cult, establishing a shiny brand that covers the lack of a constructive policy agenda, and, of course, generating a fat revenue stream.

But, Farage’s choice of football shirts as a vehicle for that might well backfire on him. He seeks to tap into football's working class culture, but that is a section of society he neither truly understands nor genuinely cares about…and THEY know it. His superficial grasp of football and its fans means he is unlikely to persuade many outside his existing followers to part with their hard-earned cash. His lack of any real awareness of the heritage and deep-rooted identity associated with football clubs means true fans will see this naked attempt at political appropriation for what it is and reject it out of hand. Genuine football fans, even those who might be inclined to vote Reform, will see the insincere exploitation of their support a mile off and are unlikely to be taken in, especially when these not-really-football shirts cost £40 (or £100 for one signed by the man himself).

There is a case for dismissing all this for what it undoubtedly is: an ill-conceived stunt designed to boost the ego and bank account of an empty political narcissist. But it reveals Farage's confidence in becoming Prime Minister at the next election and that deserves our attention.

'Farage 10' might seem laughable until you see Reform's growing poll numbers. Under our broken First Past the Post voting system, Farage could engineer his way to absolute power with an unassailable majority in 2029 - on the back of the votes of a small, extreme and unrepresentative minority of supporters. And if you still need convincing of the danger this would represent, just consider what a government under Farage would look like when his hypocritical and self-serving approach to football is applied more widely. On any given issue, he would abandon previously ‘strongly-held’ principles the moment they become inconvenient. He would not shy away from destroying things the British people cherish if they risked getting in his way. And he would put cold, hard commerce at the heart of everything - even our precious public services - because that’s the only thing he really values.

The football shirts may be a marketing gimmick, but they reveal a deeper truth about their creator's character. Farage is completely unserious about democratic leadership, temperamentally unsuited to the challenge of finding nuanced balance in competing demands, and therefore fundamentally unfit for political high office.

We owe it to ourselves and our country to make sure that, by 2029, we have an electoral system that prevents the election becoming a chaotic and unpredictable penalty shootout in which Farage could steal a win…exactly where serious commentators say we are heading with First Past the Post.

Now, before you go, please take a few seconds to click the ‘like’ button at the top of this article (the heart icon) - it costs you nothing and tells Substack that our readers value our work. If you have something to say in response to this piece - positive or negative - please do leave a comment (click the speech bubble icon). Short and sweet or long and challenging, we read ALL comments we receive and respond to as many as we can. And, finally, if you want to be first to read future articles, please click the ‘Subscribe now’ button below and select the ‘free’ option. (We don’t hide ANY of our articles behind the paywall - even free subscribers get them all.)

Many thanks! 🙏