TOILET ROLLS AND TICKER TAPE

Compared to pieces of colour-coded card that clap for you or outlawed flares, toilet rolls streaming on to the hallowed turf at any football match are, quite simply, more fun, less rehearsed and look bloody good. So imagine our disappointment when a TSLRite was recently prevented from taking a few toilet rolls into Falmer to decorate the pitch.

When I was 13 or thereabouts and the central part of the North Stand was my standing area of choice at the Goldstone, one toilet roll moment will live with me forever. The opposition eludes me but one particularly well targeted toile roll launched out of my hand and seemingly wrapped itself around the leg of the opposing ‘keeper. In my memory it took him minutes to disentangle himself from the offending paper. In reality, it was probably seconds. The ‘keeper cursed me and, for a few minutes at least, I was known as the youf who’d succeeded in beating the away ‘keeper.

But more than that, a stream of toilet roll at any football match is a sight to behold. Take the photo atop this blog. This was when Standard Liege managed to actually hold up a match. Though this was partly due to a fire having started in the stand - we're genuinely not encouraging that, just a bit of paper.

Of course, I personally think that a flare is the best thing to get any stadia rocking. During our seriously memorable penalty shoot-out FA Cup win at Woking a few seasons back, the pre-kick off flare was as electric as anything we saw on the pitch. Flares are outlawed and it’s a shame. But unfortunately we don’t live in South America and are instead dull fools that would rather not risk it. So very English, and so very embarrassing. But until the law changes on that front, we’ll just have to make do with toilet paper.

Come on Albion, I know the cleaners probably don’t like it, and I know it might annoy some players on the pitch, but let us please have some tissue paper.