England fan who’d love to watch us in final
THE grandmother of the Thai boy wearing a red England football shirt in the cave said yesterday he would go ‘crazy with happiness’ to see them play in the World Cup final.
Sompong Jaiwong, 13, and the other young footballers have been invited by Fifa to Sunday’s final in Moscow if they are rescued in time.
Yesterday his grandmother Pakkam Kamtaew, 71, said she was devoted to her only grandchild, whose parents are dead.
Known as Pong, the boy lives with his grandparents in a rented house in a poverty-stricken district by a river a few miles from the cave.
‘I am very proud of him,’ Miss Kamtaew said. ‘He has won lots of medals since he was nine. He loves sport. He is very quiet and he works hard at school and never fails exams, but as soon as school finishes he is off to practise football.
‘He loves the England team. He knows all the players. I don’t know why he likes England so much, but he just always has. He always wants an England shirt if we go clothes shopping. We heard about them being invited to the World Cup final and he would go crazy with happiness if he could go. If England were in the final, I think he would be very, very happy.’
But Miss Kamtaew said she would not let him go until he had settled back home. Holding a photograph of him, she wept: ‘We miss him so very much. Sometimes I can’t stop crying. I say to him, “I’m waiting for you, please come home”.’