With the World Cup competition about to start, women everywhere will be going shopping, doing the laundry - doing anything to avoid the TV. That is, except for a hardcore group who worship Beckham, Wayne, et al. Women's Editor Sarah Foster meets a female England fanatic.
FOR Shauna Dean, there are no shades of grey - there are simply black and white. And for black and white, read Newcastle United. The mum of one, who lives in Darlington, is a Magpie born and bred. As the only girl in a football mad household, the game was always going to feature in her formative years.
"I've got two brothers, and my dad and one brother in particular are mad about football so I always used to watch it," she says. "Even from being little we'd watch the World Cups. My brother was born in '66 so my mum watched all of the World Cup when she was pregnant with him, and he's the football mad one. He was born when England won."
As Shauna grew up, she started going to matches at St James' Park. She much preferred sport to doing schoolwork. "I played a lot of sport at school," she says. "I trained after school to be a volley ball coach. I wasn't a very good pupil but I would go for sport. I would have done sports all day long if I could have got away with it."
Then, at around 18, Shauna discovered English soccer. She admits that, like most teenage girls, she was first attracted by the players. "I can remember it was the footballers," she says. "Gary Lineker would have been my favourite and I used to like Tony Adams. I used to think he had the best pair of legs in football."
Yet while some only swooned, little caring who won or lost, Shauna says she followed every kick. "Gary Lineker could score goals and win matches, and I understood what Tony Adams had to do," she says. "I did know the game but you do have favourite players."
As an adult, her fervent support has only grown. Where once it was quite restrained, it now borders on the obsessive. "It's been manic for about the last 12 years - to the point where I have football parties," says Shauna.
"I live with my daughter and I get her involved as well. She invites her friends and I invite all my neighbours and friends, and everybody just cheers and shouts.
"The World Cup is every four years and I have a party for every England match. I could have six or seven, depending on how far they reach."
Unsurprisingly, Shauna's known as a die-hard fan. The way she describes it, when she flies her England flags, people know the contest has truly begun. "People say to me 'Shauna, when are your flags going up?'," she says. "I have a big, proper-sized flag that hangs out of my bedroom window, which is at the front of the house, and I have a strip of flags that attach to my hanging baskets.
" The flag on my car has been there for three weeks easily already, and I have a (car) sun screen with England on it, as well as an England mini football strip in the back of my car. I also have an England air freshener then last World Cup, my daughter painted a strip of flags so I could put them in my window."
And it doesn't stop there. Not content with transforming her home, Shauna, who works in advertising, also takes her passion to the office. "My desk is a shrine to David Beckham," she says. "Beckham is the ultimate. I'm only gutted that Wayne Rooney isn't good looking."
Yet if she still likes players' looks, she's just as mad about the game. "I think Steven Gerrard is outstanding, also Frank Lampard - they're just superb players," she says. "I'm watching to see if they're playing well and I shout abuse if they're not. If they miss a goal I'm gutted."
I try her on what must surely be the litmus test: if she's so clued-up, would she mind explaining the offside rule? Shauna doesn't bat an eyelid. "I can draw it," she says, then talks me through it using her hands. I nod politely as she speaks of strikers, of crossing lines and referees. I'm none the wiser, but she's effectively proved her point - she really does seem to know her stuff. When I admit my own ignorance, she becomes coy. "Do you think I'm mad? Because girly girls think I am," she says sheepishly.
What comes through clearly is her genuine passion - which Shauna says is all encompassing. "I'm passionate about everything. I'm either passionate or I'm not interested. I don't think there tends to be a middle ground," she says.
"We (she and her daughter Charlotte) went on holiday and we went to watch the Champions' League with Arsenal against Barcelona. I'm not an Arsenal supporter but I supported the English team. I'm passionate about anything to do with sport for England. If England are in there, I'll cheer them on all the way."
I suggest that for many women - myself included - the lure of football is simply baffling. Shauna tries to enlighten me, though her analogy is rather strange.
"Imagine your wedding day," she begins. "You know when you feel that tightness in your tummy, like when you walked down the aisle? That's how you feel when you're watching football on the telly. In the last match when we got knocked out (of the last World Cup) by Brazil, I had a party at 7.30 in the morning and people cried. I cried. It was devastating because you think you're going to do it and you're willing them to do it.
"I get angry more than anything, then a little tear might come."
Yet, along with the angst come lighter moments. One of Shauna's enduring memories is of an incident in a pub.
"I went to watch a football match in The Wheatsheaf in Darlington about eight years ago and we were shouting at the telly," she says. "There were some sarcastic, chauvinistic comments like 'what are women doing here? They don't know about football,' and I took umbrage at that and said 'we do know what we're talking about'.
"One lad said 'I bet you can't name Newcastle's team', so the bet was that if I named the team, he had to give me the Newcastle shirt off his back. I won the bet and I wasn't going to take the shirt but his friend said I had to to put him in his place, so I took it. I still have the shirt today."
She'd dearly love to see England play live, but for this World Cup at least, Shauna is staying put. She says it's probably just as well. "I'd love to go to Germany but my mum doesn't want me to because she knows what I'm like," she says with a grin.
"If there was carry on I'd be likely to be in the thick of it - but that would be by accident. It would be 'free the World Cup one'." So, as in the past, she'll just be shouting at the telly. As for the men, they'd better just make way.
* Next week: when God meets the beautiful game, an interview with a woman sports chaplain.
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