By Dr Rahim Said
There are a few places in Malaysia more dangerous than an old boys’ WhatsApp group. Not because anyone is planning a revolution. Heaven forbid.
Most are planning an afternoon nap. But beneath the barrage of “Good Morning” roses, miracle cures for aching knees and questionable videos about coconut oil lies a lethal weapon: gallows humour.
The latest casualty is the 2026 World Cup. After Argentina’s victory over Switzerland, someone triumphantly circulated the tournament bracket with an enthusiastic message:
“Tonton, jangan tak tonton!” (Watch it. Don’t you dare miss it!)
Perfectly innocent. Or so everyone thought. Then came the inevitable reply from one of our more mischievous classmates.
“Why?”
That single word was the football equivalent of poking a hornet’s nest. A friend answered with devastating logic.
“Tuan Haji, you are already 80. By the next World Cup, you’ll be 84.”
Just when everyone was recovering from that tackle, another classmate slid in with the finishing move.
“Belum tentu ada lagi atau tidak pada tahun 2030!” (Who knows whether we’ll even still be around in 2030!)
Silence.
Then came the flood of laughing emojis. Only eighty-year-olds can joke so cheerfully about their own expiry date.
When you’re 20, four years feels like forever. You are planning careers, marriages and mortgages.
When you’re 80, four years is no longer measured by calendars. It is measured by cardiologists, blood-pressure readings and whether your knees will allow you to celebrate another Messi goal without requiring physiotherapy.
The World Cup, once simply a football tournament, quietly becomes something else. It becomes a rendezvous with time.
Perhaps Shakespeare understood this better than FIFA ever could when he wrote in As You Like It: “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.”
Some players simply have fewer tournaments left.
Yet there is something wonderfully Malaysian about refusing to surrender to melancholy. Instead of discussing mortality, we disguise it as football banter.
One minute, we’re arguing whether England can finally bring football home. Next, we’re wondering whether we’ll still be home ourselves in 2030.
The philosopher Michel de Montaigne observed that “To philosophise is to learn how to die.” Malaysians improve on this. We learn how to laugh while discussing it over WhatsApp.
Old age also changes sporting priorities. At 18, you dream of lifting the World Cup. At 80, you merely hope to stay awake until the penalty shoot-out.
The match now competes not with homework but with medication schedules. Kick-off at 3 a.m. is no longer an inconvenience. It’s conveniently close to one’s regular visit to the bathroom. In fact, many elderly supporters no longer need alarm clocks.
Their prostates provide excellent timekeeping.
Football has become an unlikely reminder that time keeps advancing, whether England wins, Argentina loses, or VAR finds yet another toenail offside.
Perhaps that is why these old classmates refuse to stop watching. Every World Cup is no longer merely another sporting event.
It is another reunion. Another chance to exchange jokes.
Another opportunity to prove they still remember every player from Pelé to Messi, even if they cannot remember where they left their reading glasses.
As the Roman poet Horace wisely advised, carpe diem—”seize the day.” Our 80-year-old classmates have updated it for the age of football:
“Seize the tournament.” Watch every match. Laugh at every joke. Mock your own mortality before it has the chance to mock you.
And if someone says, “By the next World Cup you’ll be 84,” simply reply with the optimism that has sustained football fans for generations:
“Fine. But first, let’s see whether England can actually win one before I go.”
WE