We should all be able to enjoy football festivities

Waking up to a Glasgow full of hope and promise was something to witness. I found myself remixing Yes Sir, I can Boogie with Flower of Scotland in my head as I made my way out the door.

The first sight of groups of kilts gathered around cafes in the southside all smiles and excitement nurtured a fierce pride within me. Glasgow was transformed into something I as a 23- year-old had never witnessed before.

A new lust for my city was born. Holding up my hands, I was never a keen football player nor do I pretend to be but suddenly an urge to header a ball into the back of the net overwhelmed me. Football was coming hame.

Fans in Glasgow Green decorated their benches with blue and white and rampant lions. A group of people had on Loch Ness monster hats and Aye Sir I Can Boogie Tops. A ripple of applause came when the sun showed its face for a whole ten seconds.

It was all very Scottish, very exciting and, at times, very comforting.

Yet you cannot just enter the football fan world as a young woman reborn with rose tinted lenses.

With football festivities come streets to avoid. Maybe I was paranoid but no Sir, sometimes I didn’t feel much like boogying.

“The atmosphere in Glasgow is just great isn’t it?”, a male friend of mine said when he spotted me out in the city centre. “It is!” I said out of ease.

And I wish it was completely because the air was so alive and vibrant. Even with the upset and defeat, the buzz in Glasgow was still very much preserved by people kicking a ball about on Argyle Street and laughing with friends. Fans on Buchanan Street danced with boom boxes blasting out the football favourites.

However, when 90 per cent of the people out on the street you see are men you do wonder where that leaves a slight population majority of Glaswegian women. So let us boogie till the cows come home even in defeat and even in the rain but remember that women deserve a place in the festivities too.