I was struck by this last year, and I am again:

Paris has to be the world’s biggest city that cares almost not at all about team sports.

For that matter, nearly the whole of France has escaped the maladie that is sports fandom. Which may actually be healthy, as well as unique. But it certainly is weird.

To walk around the streets of this town … is to be unaware that team sports exist.

Paris has one soccer team, Paris Saint Germain (PSG), which has a smallish stadium tucked away in the southwest corner of the city (a tourist could be here a month and never see it) and generally fields mediocre clubs.

French football, in general, is treated mostly with great big Gallic yawns from Lille to Marseille. If it is on TV in a bar, someone may watch. But the bars are more likely to be showing a game from England, Spain or even Italy.

I went to the home page of the French sports newspaper “L’Equipe” … and it’s hard to imagine even the French getting excited about the menu there.

Let’s see, PSG playing in Israel against Maccabi Tel Aviv in a Europa League competition (the former Uefa Cup, for the clubs not good enough to play in the Champions League) … and how Lille will play against a little-known Romanian club in the same tournament tomorrow … and a feature story about how if Andre-Pierre Gignac doesn’t sign with Marseille it’s no big deal because they have some guy (Kevin Gameiro) I’ve never heard of to step in for him …

And in non-soccer news, how things are going for Richard Gasquet in the ATP tournament in Cincinnati (which not even Cincinnati cares about), a story about what’s up with the Racing Montpellier rugby club (rugby is popular in the south of France) … and farther down the page, in links to the “magazine” … a story about how the national soccer team is “the bad boys” of France (breaking news, it’s not), and a photo montage on male polo players and female swimmers that is so tame that Disney would approve …

Also, then, look at the sports listed by L’Equipe across the top of its home page. First is soccer,  second is auto/moto (what?), third is tennis/golf, fourth is rugby, fifth is basket/hand/volley (basketball, handball, volleyball, pretty much all the same thing, sure) …

Anyway, yes, I am struck by the lack of passion here for team sports. PSG could lose every match, and Paris wouldn’t care. The French League could stop playing and the country might not notice.

The French may be into personal sports, which would be a healthy alternative to sitting on a chair watching football. I think this may be true … but I can’t swear to it, either.  Not like I’ve seen the figures for wake-boarding/rock-climbing/cycling in France, though they seem to embrace this sort of thing — or at least appreciate people who do that.

Ultimately, though, I think France just doesn’t care about sports. The French have other things to do. From the open window of this apartment in the Marais, I can hear a sort of soft wave of conversation washing down the Rue de Tresor from the four cafes on the street.

All those people, and none of them watching PSG at Maccabi Tel Aviv.