One of my treasured books is one by the incomparable Patrick Collins, for over 40 years a sports columnist on national newspapers. The book is `Among the Fans` and recounts a year which he spent watching the watchers of various events across the sporting spectrum - from the Ashes, through darts, point-to point, tennis and cricket to football and so on.
I hope he won`t mind too much if I refer to a passage in the introduction to his book, for it says much about the mindset of the `normal` football fans - that is, those who have a loyalty to a club with whom they have a personal or family connection, rather than those who hunt for what might be their own version of glory.
It goes like this. Having made some faintly uncharitable observations about Bolton Wanderers and the way in which their followers tolerated their ponderous tactics, he was taken to task by one of his readers who pointed out that football supporters are allocated a club at birth and that fate had given him Bolton Wanderers. He said he had been born a mere four miles from the old ground at Burnden Park and, as a result, Bolton was his team.
He then added something rather poignant, "Supporting Bolton is a bit like having a three legged dog. You wish it had all four but you still love it."
Now many of us supporters of whatever club has chosen us will understand precisely what he means. In a strange way we may be perversely proud of the predicament we find ourselves in, we accept fate`s allocation because we are good at loyalty. It`s more of a condition than a choice and in that sense it gives the club something of a free ride. It may be overpriced and underperforming, plagued by mediocraties on the field and buffoons in the boardroom but none of that seems to matter, for we are stuck with our shop-soiled inheritance - our three legged dog.
The gentleman from Bolton could have been speaking for me and my fellow devotees of Southampton FC, for goodness knows we fit the description uncomfortably well right now. But hope - the one that kills you - is supposed to spring eternally and all we watchers of the south coast`s finest can do is keep the faith alive, rather than to defect to what for us would be the counterfeit `attractions` of Old Trafford or Anfield. So come on you Saints. Surely the promised land is somewhere out there?
He then added something rather poignant, "Supporting Bolton is a bit like having a three legged dog. You wish it had all four but you still love it."
Now many of us supporters of whatever club has chosen us will understand precisely what he means. In a strange way we may be perversely proud of the predicament we find ourselves in, we accept fate`s allocation because we are good at loyalty. It`s more of a condition than a choice and in that sense it gives the club something of a free ride. It may be overpriced and underperforming, plagued by mediocraties on the field and buffoons in the boardroom but none of that seems to matter, for we are stuck with our shop-soiled inheritance - our three legged dog.
The gentleman from Bolton could have been speaking for me and my fellow devotees of Southampton FC, for goodness knows we fit the description uncomfortably well right now. But hope - the one that kills you - is supposed to spring eternally and all we watchers of the south coast`s finest can do is keep the faith alive, rather than to defect to what for us would be the counterfeit `attractions` of Old Trafford or Anfield. So come on you Saints. Surely the promised land is somewhere out there?
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