Soccer in the United Kingdom is a celebration of the British at their most tribal. A fan of one team might live next door to a fan of another and if they don different shirts on game day, these neighbors will be steeped in different lore and howl for different outcomes.
The forces that pit one tribe against another will seem both mysterious and trivial to nonfans. With occasional exceptions. When Southampton F.C. played Swansea City a few weeks ago even the soccer agnostic would have realized that the game highlighted a major difference. A difference on a national scale.
The stands were essentially empty. That’s because the game was held in Swansea, which is in Wales, where the government, battling the coronavirus, was then limiting sporting events’ crowds to just 50. (The rules have since been eased.)
“In normal circumstances, I would be on my way to Wales this afternoon,” Mark Littlewood said on the day of the game. Mr. Littlewood is the director general of the Institute of Economic Affairs, a free-market think tank, and a Southampton fan.
