Football in the Stars

Can astrology help predict England’s success in this year’s World Cup? I was up for finding out.

Housed in a grand and elegant room in the Theosophical Society premises near Baker Street, Astrological Lodge of Great Britain hosts talks on Monday nights, the most recent being on the the astrology of football. It specifically looked into what our chances will be for the World Cup 2010, held in South Africa this summer.

While the idea of using astrology might seem ridiculous, footballers themselves are actually remarkably superstitious. Top clubs have had feng shui (the astrology of space) performed on their stadiums and pitches.

At the famous Maracana stadium in Rio de Janeiro, witch doctors do hypnotic drumming rituals at the pitch before every game. Brazil has won the World Cup more times than any other nation; so could voodoo be the key to their success?

Despite football’s tendency towards more alternative ways to improve performance, attendance at the talk was rather low. Most astrologers tend to be women of a certain age wearing purple, not known for their enthusiasm about football.

So, how do you do an astrology chart for football?

First off – as astrologer Bethea Jenner demonstrated – you set the time for the inaugural meeting of the Football Association (26/10/1863, 19.00hrs, London). Football is therefore a Scorpio.

Bethea then put up the England chart (yes countries have charts, as do cities and businesses), the 1966 winning chart and the chart of the FA for comparison. England itself is Aries and the England team always play better in red, the Arian colour.

We then looked at the chart of England manager, and Gemini, Fabio Capello. Bethea was optimistic. Compared to Sven’s chart – where his Neptunian philandering (secrecy, fantasy) coincided with the relaxation on wives’ and girlfriends’ attendance and the whole WAG phenomenon – Fabio will get us a long way. ‘He’s tactical,’ says Bethea.

She thought Beckham should play. As a Taurus he’s not a speedy player, but typical for his sign, has longevity. ‘He won’t last 90 minutes but he’s important symbolically,’ she says. Sadly she was more right than she realised, and it looks set that he won’t be playing any minutes at all.

Looking at Wayne Rooney’s tense chart, Bethea and fellow astrologer Neil Spencer clash. Bethea thinks Rooney will do ‘something awesome’ whereas Neil believes he will injure himself.

The chart for the first England match in South Africa is spectacularly good. We may not win the entire competition but we will go far. In the past, Germany, with its Neptune on the FA’s ascendant at 24 degrees of Gemini, has ‘shattered all our dreams’. But this year, Bethea doesn’t believe that Germany or England nemesis Argentina will win.

Astrological Lodge of London
50 Gloucester Place
Marylebone
W1U 8AE

Image by Jared courtesy of Flickr