Street football

It’s Colombia v Switzerland in the round of 16 of the World Cup and Elephant and Castle in south London is heaving under a mass of yellow football shirts. A large crowd has gathered round a small screen mounted on the back of a cargo bike. Those who can’t see are across the road with a phone screen propped on the head of a mop. Football has perfected London on a hot summer evening.

The Elephant contains the bulk of Latino London. But the city has not been kind to the community here. An enormous redevelopment has sprung up in place of the old shopping centre and a number of traders have been relocated to swelteringly hot units next to the park. For the Colombian diaspora, which has been growing here since the 1990s, “redevelopment” has become a byword for displacement.

But tonight, watching Luis Díaz storm down the wing, people can forget their tribulations. The World Cup can do that; people chat excitedly about where to buy cold beer without missing too much of the action. Someone lights up a hash spliff and the blue smell wafts over the crowd.

“De dónde eres, bro?”

“Man, I’m from Finland…”

“Ah, no worries, bro, got you a beer anyway…”

We can only make out the screen on the bike if those at the front sit, school assembly style, on the pavement while the rest of us stand on the kerb. Tensions rise as a police van slows to an accusatory pace as it passes the crowd. Surely they can’t shut this down? Can they? The crowd launches into a chorus of “Chúpalo! Chúpalo!” (“suck it!”) until the van moves on.

Half-time brings chaos. The bike owner suddenly decides to relocate to the other side of the road. The crowd rushes to land a good spot. Then the reverse happens and everyone rushes back to where they started. I briefly consider joining the growing throng next to the mop but, luckily, a friend has anticipated the bike’s reversal and saved me a valuable space; you need to be canny at times like these.

The second half is perhaps even more uneventful than the first, but it doesn’t matter. A girl shouts across the spectators to her friend who brings plastic shot glasses and distributes them. If you look up you can see people leaning out of windows at Castle Square, squinting at the tiny running men on the other side of the world. In the 66th minute, James Rodríguez – one of the last remnants of the previous era of football when the game was slower, sexier and less organised – is subbed off.

The game moves remorselessly to penalties.

The first Colombian penalty is buried – laces through it. The second rattles tantalisingly against the bar. Groans. The third is saved. The horror, the horror. The fourth is dispatched beautifully and, eventually, it all comes down to the goalkeeper. If Colombia’s No 1 can save this, the country stays in the game, and the Elephant is in a blissful state of shared purpose. A teenager remarks under his breath that a save would tear the roof off this place, and then, since we’re outside, his friend corrects him: “Bro, the sky has no roof…”

But then some kind of metaphysical roof does give way and the occasion comes crashing down as the Swiss substitute, Rubén Vargas, drills the ball into the far corner of the net. It’s all over. The Colombians have lost the great prize of international football: the excuse to have a party. It’s almost midnight, and we all have work tomorrow.

Illustration by Oscar Ingham/Observer Design