There I was – naked as the day I was born. If I had been born wearing high heels and a pair of black chiffon knickers, that is. I’d showered, waxed and shaved; my entire body had been anointed with creams, slathered in perfume, buffed and brushed into perfection. Or at least as close as was possible – perfection must be flawed and all that.

I wandered into the lounge. Thomas, taking an appreciative look at me, made a lunge and pulled me onto his lap. Woo hoo! I’m not in the habit of wearing nothing but my skimpies in the deepest, darkest midwinter without hoping for a positive reaction, so I was glad to get one.
He picked me up and deposited me on the couch, but as he was nuzzling my breasts he suddenly stopped, lifted his head up and said the words no woman should ever have to hear – “‘It’ll have to be a quickie or you’ll have to wait. The football’s starting.’”
What? What??? I thought these scenarios only happened in bad comedies! Oh no, my friends, it happened to me. Me! Moi! Damn long-term relationships! Balls to them! No one ever passes up a good long shag session in the honeymoon period, do they?
Now a girl has two choices when confronted with this kind of situation. One is to channel her inner Miss Piggy and use her handbag to deliver a full body-blow to her errant lover with a loud “Hiii-yah!” The other is just to thank the Lord that her man is devoted to football and not five-day test cricket. I decided on the second option. But I wasn’t going to slink off too quietly. “Explain the off-side rule to me again,” I said.
I’ve learnt two basic things when it comes to men and balls – (1) don’t kick them in the balls (unless you really, really have to, and then you’re still better off with a twist and squeeze, or so I’ve been told… sorry lads) and (2) don’t come between them and football. Break either rule and it’s bound to end in tears.
Since I’ve been hanging out with Thomas I’ve learnt more about football than I ever wanted or needed to know. I used to know absolutely nothing and it bothered me not a jot. It was a happier, more innocent time. And I expected (it) to stay that way. After all, on one of my first dates with Thomas the conversation somehow turned to the beautiful game. Was he a fan, I enquired?
“Not really,” he told me. “Well, I sometimes watch Manchester United with my dad. We’ve done it since I was a kid. It’s just a thing for us to do, to hang out together.”
The lying bastard! What he meant was “Yes, I love football. Adore it; always have, always will. I watch all the Man U games. Oh and also the matches of any team who are near them in the UK Premier League tables. And sometimes other games as well, just for fun. Oh, and I follow the Champions League. And the…”
Not that I have anything against shagging football fans per se – it would be a lonely life if I did – but it was false advertising. How would he have liked it if I’d promised him a whole slew of sexual adventures only to turn around and say all I was prepared to do was the missionary, Wednesdays and Saturday evening only, between the hours of 9 and 10? Exactly!
But I digress… The match ended and his attention once more turned to me. “You’re wearing clothes,” he accused. Well, naturally. I wasn’t going to spend ninety minutes, half time and injury time in nothing but a scrap of expensive fabric. “Think of it as my strip,” I said. “Strip is exactly what I was thinking,” he said making a grab at me. But I did my best Cristiano Ronaldo manoeuvre and danced out of the way. “Not so fast, mister. You’re facing relegation. Let’s see what you’ve got.”
The game was this – the bed was the pitch and Thomas had to get my clothes off using only his feet or head. Like football, hands were not allowed. Luckily for him I was wearing a dress and not a pair of jeans, and to give him a fair chance I’d removed my stockings.
After a few minutes of struggling, he managed to get the zip down using his teeth, but then he got stuck. The dress wasn’t flimsy enough to fall to the floor, so he decided to use his toes to grip the fabric, but after his foot slipped twice, once connecting with my thigh, he decided to give it up before I red carded him.
Thomas then decided on a different approach and went straight for my underpants. These he managed comparatively easily and with a triumphant flourish declared that, as he’d just scored a sizzling goal, as far as he was concerned, the rest of my clothes could stay put. “Nope,” I said. “Off-side rule.”
He tried, he did. He managed to get the dress down to my shoulders and after that, it wouldn’t budge – my excellent defensive moves making life difficult for him. Instead he launched at it, gave it a good tug and it fell to the floor. I, like football fans all around the world, was outraged – that’s not sporting behaviour!
“Handling the ball – it’s only a yellow card offence,” he informed me. Red card surely? Or was it? Damn! I didn’t know. I should have been paying more attention. I guessed he was bullshitting but I figured he’d been punished enough, I was horny and we seemed to be playing rugby anyway as he tackled me down onto the bed.
Afterwards we were lying there, doing the obligatory post-coital cuddle when he began to make noises about being hungry. “You’d better make it quick,” I said. “You’ve got fifteen minutes.”
He looked at me.
“Half-time.”