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WATCH: Last Night’s Reading-Bradford Streaker Is the True Gatekeeper of Britishness

There's nothing we excel at more than disrupting sporting events in the most basic way possible.

The pitch invader at the Madejski last night. — Football__Tweet (@Football__Tweet)March 17, 2015

This article originally appeared on VICE UK.

Streakers are great, aren't they? Because, what are they trying to achieve? They turn to the world and they say, "Behold, everyone: behold my patchy body hair and tremulous man boobs." Then they run about in jeans a bit and go, "Actually no, that's all I really had in the tank," and then four hard dudes in fluoro jackets try to sprint after them, and they dodge one and then crash into the other. "Fuck," they say, as blood fills their mouth, "I hope my kids aren't watching this."

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Just look at the streaker from last night's Reading-Bradford FA Cup quarter-final replay, which Reading won 3-0. When he first turns up on the pitch the crowd are appalled by him, flicking Vs and booing and saying every single variation of the word "cunt," and then—slowly, and you can feel it trickling through the crowd like a wave—they start warming to him. There's the first roly-poly, then the second, then, as he pikes towards the floor for his third semi-soft landing, they're cheering, cheering for the streaker, cheering for the perfunctory conversation he's going to have to have with the police later, and they watch as he dives neck-first into the turf for the fourth time in a row and think, collectively: 'That man is pure joy, distilled into one pissed bloke in a webbed-belt-and-ASDA-jeans combo; that man is a small crack of light in this dark, terrible world.'

Then the bodyguards pile on and all hope is lost.

It's very British, to take your top off and wobble your gut at a baying mob while Bradford lose to Reading. We like to pretend we are all royalty and cucumber sandwiches and Downton Abbey extras, but we're not: we streak and we eat chips and we name tough dogs after boxers. Disrupting sporting events in the most basic way possible is what we excel at: we shout, "Come on, Tim!" at Andy Murray; we throw water bottles at Usain Bolt; Karl Power, a man who specializes in putting on a full Manchester United kit and then sidling into the team photo at the start of matches has his own Wikipedia page. Fuck the Empire; that's our true legacy.

What's your story, Reading-Bradford streaker? What happened to you during puberty that left you with a body athletic enough to do a jumping forward roll, but so stiff you cannot physically pace your feet apart more than 12 inches when you attempt to run? And what, more importantly, compelled you to jog tightly onto the pitch, do a loop around a bewildered Reading goalkeeper, jump onto the ground four times then get bundled into a back room by match security? What is going on in your life that this is considered a thrill? Legitimate question. Very open to an interview. Call our reception.

Follow Joel on Twitter.