WHEN I was growing up, Saturday teatime would be punctuated with the soothing mechanical blips of the football results coming through. 'Bolton Wanderers: 1… Crystal Palace: 2.'

Even thinking about the sound now, it's comforting - everything was as it should be; fishfingers and peas for tea, and A Team on later.

I don't remember ever learning anything about football, I just knew from birth.

My dad has been a dyed- (red)-in-the-wool Manchester United supporter since the Munich air crash in 1958 when he was a little boy, and so as well as a Snoopy sticker album, I also had a Man Utd one.

I was as excited to go to Old Trafford as I was to see Swan Lake, and can still name all the players from the eighties squads. I live in hope that the category will come up on Pointless.

Even my Nanna was swept up in football fever - she always had a poster of the current United team up in her house, and even now, at the age of 97, she's still an avid watcher of all their games, and keeps up with the latest hirings and firings.

I stopped being interested in league football when I hit my teens and discovered The Cure, cider, and writing cringy poetry about doomed love and the apocalypse, but I have always loved the World Cup.

I will keep the handy guide included in the paper and dutifully fill in the results as the matches are played.

There are plenty of places to watch the World Cup fixtures in Salisbury over the next few weeks including Bar 44 and The Slug and Lettuce in Fisherton Street, while the England games will also be screened in Qudos, Catherine Street.

I'll be watching some at home and some down the pub, but looking forward to watching with my dad the most.