A higher perspective

[Psaw2]

Following on from a previous thread re Mansfield etc, my future as a Cambridge fan might be in your hands. Currently I am not going because we have had 25 years of failure, and I cant take it any more. We have stagnated. Our new owner says he will cover losses for five years but that's it.

There is now a ceiling at the top of div 1, progress for the likes of you and me is impossible. With the reality of progress now gone, is lower league football now just a ritual? You go down to the conference, you will come up, maybe to div 1, maybe to the championship for a season.

Then you will drop. So it will be for us. The owners of Peterboro have pumped zillions into that club, they have gates of about six thousand, you don't get a ground and players like that on a gate like that. The owners must think they can go higher than the championship, they are deluded. Just getting promoted will be an act of magic.

Someone said just winning is enough, is it?, the opposition doesn't matter. Would you apply for a job with no prospects.? Unless you can hit the top, there is no point. That's my view anyway. If Cambridge won div 2 this year, I would give a yawn. If they won div2 with a realistic chance of higher league football, and yes the Premiership, that would be different.

A level playing field ended when teams kept their home gate money instead of sharing. This is the result.

MONEY WINS. Everytime. Is winning enough, is watching a game of football enough? Progress beyond the lower leagues will not happen.

[ncfcog]

Following on from a previous thread re Mansfield etc, my future as a Cambridge fan might be in your hands. Currently I am not going because we have had 25 years of failure, and I cant take it any more. We have stagnated. Our new owner says he will cover losses for five years but that's it.

There is now a ceiling at the top of div 1, progress for the likes of you and me is impossible. With the reality of progress now gone, is lower league football now just a ritual? You go down to the conference, you will come up, maybe to div 1, maybe to the championship for a season.

Then you will drop. So it will be for us. The owners of Peterboro have pumped zillions into that club, they have gates of about six thousand, you don't get a ground and players like that on a gate like that. The owners must think they can go higher than the championship, they are deluded. Just getting promoted will be an act of magic.

Someone said just winning is enough, is it?, the opposition doesn't matter. Would you apply for a job with no prospects.? Unless you can hit the top, there is no point. That's my view anyway. If Cambridge won div 2 this year, I would give a yawn. If they won div2 with a realistic chance of higher league football, and yes the Premiership, that would be different.

A level playing field ended when teams kept their home gate money instead of sharing. This is the result.

MONEY WINS. Everytime. Is winning enough, is watching a game of football enough? Progress beyond the lower leagues will not happen.

I think I speak for most on here that as far as Notts are concerned just having a club to support is enough for us right now. Yes we want success, yes we want to get out of this league as soon as possible but of course we want that to be done in a manner the ensures the financial future of the club is not put at risk.

We have competed at the highest level and in the past sustained a considerable period of time at tier 2. There is nothing to say that with the right management this can't be acjieved at some point again in the future but right now we just want to see things improving on the pitch in the same way they have already improved off it.

As for you Roger, stop fcuking whinging, get off your backside and go support your club because it is the lily livered fair weather supporters like you that can make that difference, without your support you are contributing to the potential demise of your club and as a result you will have no right to complain.

[Scanlon's Hatrick]

Following on from a previous thread re Mansfield etc, my future as a Cambridge fan might be in your hands. Currently I am not going because we have had 25 years of failure, and I cant take it any more. We have stagnated. Our new owner says he will cover losses for five years but that's it.

There is now a ceiling at the top of div 1, progress for the likes of you and me is impossible. With the reality of progress now gone, is lower league football now just a ritual? You go down to the conference, you will come up, maybe to div 1, maybe to the championship for a season.

Then you will drop. So it will be for us. The owners of Peterboro have pumped zillions into that club, they have gates of about six thousand, you don't get a ground and players like that on a gate like that. The owners must think they can go higher than the championship, they are deluded. Just getting promoted will be an act of magic.

Someone said just winning is enough, is it?, the opposition doesn't matter. Would you apply for a job with no prospects.? Unless you can hit the top, there is no point. That's my view anyway. If Cambridge won div 2 this year, I would give a yawn. If they won div2 with a realistic chance of higher league football, and yes the Premiership, that would be different.

A level playing field ended when teams kept their home gate money instead of sharing. This is the result.

MONEY WINS. Everytime. Is winning enough, is watching a game of football enough? Progress beyond the lower leagues will not happen.

I have been a Notts fan home and away for the best part of 50 years.
Football now is a world apart from when I started going.
If the likes of Wednesday, Sunderland, Portsmouth etc can't reach or sustain life in the Premier, what chance have our clubs ? None whatsoever.

I almost go out of habit these days, and enjoy the afternoon, hoping that the actual football doesn't end up spoiling it.
Smaller clubs like ours need the fans to keep believing, we will never get that obscene TV money.

Only a handful of clubs can achieve perceived success so all the others are by definition - "failures"

I am going to Bromley on Saturday, setting off at 07.00. I will enjoy a rare day out regardless of what Notts do.
My life doesn't revolve around them anymore, but I will still be going to Torquay, Barrow and a couple more, albeit for a day out with my friends.

I know exactly what you mean and would imagine most football fans feel the same.

[bridpie78]

I am not a massive fan of football at premier league/european level,it doesn't even feel like the game i fell in love with in the 1980's but there is a certain glamour and status to be acheived by getting to the promised land if only for a brief stint,its the ever distant pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

If ever i get disheartened as a fan of a lower and now non league club i just look back at the tables from when i first started, we regularly used to have lower league battles with teams like Wolves,Sunderland,Wigan,Hull ,Cardiff and Swansea and they have all had some success over the years there are others too and i also take hope from seeing teams like Preston and the rise of Luton who are now doing well in the championship, once you get to the second tier and can consolidate it is not beyond the realms of possibility that a money bags owner will snap you up and transform the club into premier league contenders, just look at Bournemouth and Wolves.

As a Notts fan i'd like to see us one day back in the Championship and being able to go back to the days of having a local derby with the F-word where we are only slight underdogs not whipping boys,it'd make all the rubbish years worthwhile and mean so much more if we beat them because of the long hard journey back and all the bad days we've had to endure.

You dont give up on your club,your club gives up on you.

[Psaw2]

Ncfcog, I am not a fair weather fan. I hardly missed a home game till I left Cambridge at 20, then spent time and money seeing them when I could. What is amazing now, is that I can drive 18 miles and im there, but not bothered. Scanlon sums it up. When you've spent a lifetime on it, its hard to give up. United are at home to Swindon tomorrow, but I wont be going. What I will do is listen to it on the radio.

Another aspect is I have no real link with the club apart from growing up in Cambridge. I am not personally involved in the day to day running, finance or maintenance. If Cambridge won the Premiership what difference would it make to my life?....none. Oh, it would make me feel good for a day. Can you remember who won Division one in 1961? No me neither.

It all comes and goes. What it is good for is passing time, time that could be better spent. Im done sitting in the cold watching overpaid talentless triers making a living. Waiting for that game, or season when something goes right. one season in 25 for Cambridge, and that was 2nd in the conference, and the FA trophy.

Big deal that one. The radio is about right, with a decent cup of tea and a biscuit in easy reach. Disillusioned of Ely.

[bridpie78]

Ncfcog, I am not a fair weather fan. I hardly missed a home game till I left Cambridge at 20, then spent time and money seeing them when I could. What is amazing now, is that I can drive 18 miles and im there, but not bothered. Scanlon sums it up. When you've spent a lifetime on it, its hard to give up. United are at home to Swindon tomorrow, but I wont be going. What I will do is listen to it on the radio.

Another aspect is I have no real link with the club apart from growing up in Cambridge. I am not personally involved in the day to day running, finance or maintenance. If Cambridge won the Premiership what difference would it make to my life?....none. Oh, it would make me feel good for a day. Can you remember who won Division one in 1961? No me neither.

It all comes and goes. What it is good for is passing time, time that could be better spent. Im done sitting in the cold watching overpaid talentless triers making a living. Waiting for that game, or season when something goes right. one season in 25 for Cambridge, and that was 2nd in the conference, and the FA trophy.

Big deal that one. The radio is about right, with a decent cup of tea and a biscuit in easy reach. Disillusioned of Ely.

9 games with Dan Jones in defence and it's killed your love for the game, surprised you lasted this long

[ncfcog]

Ncfcog, I am not a fair weather fan. I hardly missed a home game till I left Cambridge at 20, then spent time and money seeing them when I could. What is amazing now, is that I can drive 18 miles and im there, but not bothered. Scanlon sums it up. When you've spent a lifetime on it, its hard to give up. United are at home to Swindon tomorrow, but I wont be going. What I will do is listen to it on the radio.

Another aspect is I have no real link with the club apart from growing up in Cambridge. I am not personally involved in the day to day running, finance or maintenance. If Cambridge won the Premiership what difference would it make to my life?....none. Oh, it would make me feel good for a day. Can you remember who won Division one in 1961? No me neither.

It all comes and goes. What it is good for is passing time, time that could be better spent. Im done sitting in the cold watching overpaid talentless triers making a living. Waiting for that game, or season when something goes right. one season in 25 for Cambridge, and that was 2nd in the conference, and the FA trophy.

Big deal that one. The radio is about right, with a decent cup of tea and a biscuit in easy reach. Disillusioned of Ely.

Roger, firstly let me apologise for my initial comments, maybe they were a bit unfair. I can tell from your posts that you have a real love for the game which is one of the reasons you take the time to get involved in discussions on forums like this.

I take your point about sitting in the cold watching overpaid talentless triers making a living, that is something we are all too familiar with here I can assure you. In fact as pointed out by Bridpie you have one such player we have already had to endure ourselves so enjoy.

As is often mentioned on these pages when it comes to Notts "it's the hope that kills you", but it is also the very same hope that keeps you going. I had a footballing hiatus in my thirties, work, family, finances and geography all conspired to limit the occassions I could go and watch Notts. For the last 12 or so years I have been lucky enough to get back into it and as horrible and depressing as some or indeed most of that time has been it still doesn't change the feeling of utter joy I get when I walk through those turnstiles, it takes me back to my youth and I'm a sucker for nostalgia.

Everyone is right, television money and sponsorship etc has created a chasm in terms of the footballing have's and have not's, my one true hope is that the filthy rich PL teams all bugger off and form a Euro league which would in turn require the FA and EFL to have a complete restructure and can only hope they would take that as an opportunity to implement a more financially level playing field for their members which in the long run can only benefit clubs like ours.

I'm sorry you have lost the love Roger, it's a real shame, but I can only encourage you to put yourself out again and make the effort to attend just a few matches if you can because the longer you go without experiencing a live match day experience the harder it is to rekindle that love for the game you are so obviously disallusioned with.

[bridpie78]

Roger, firstly let me apologise for my initial comments, maybe they were a bit unfair. I can tell from your posts that you have a real love for the game which is one of the reasons you take the time to get involved in discussions on forums like this.

I take your point about sitting in the cold watching overpaid talentless triers making a living, that is something we are all too familiar with here I can assure you. In fact as pointed out by Bridpie you have one such player we have already had to endure ourselves so enjoy.

As is often mentioned on these pages when it comes to Notts "it's the hope that kills you", but it is also the very same hope that keeps you going. I had a footballing hiatus in my thirties, work, family, finances and geography all conspired to limit the occassions I could go and watch Notts. For the last 12 or so years I have been lucky enough to get back into it and as horrible and depressing as some or indeed most of that time has been it still doesn't change the feeling of utter joy I get when I walk through those turnstiles, it takes me back to my youth and I'm a sucker for nostalgia.

Everyone is right, television money and sponsorship etc has created a chasm in terms of the footballing have's and have not's, my one true hope is that the filthy rich PL teams all bugger off and form a Euro league which would in turn require the FA and EFL to have a complete restructure and can only hope they would take that as an opportunity to implement a more financially level playing field for their members which in the long run can only benefit clubs like ours.

I'm sorry you have lost the love Roger, it's a real shame, but I can only encourage you to put yourself out again and make the effort to attend just a few matches if you can because the longer you go without experiencing a live match day experience the harder it is to rekindle that love for the game you are so obviously disallusioned with.

When you support a sh*t team it is often a slog and can feel depressing but when you later look back at what feels like wasted time and energy one good season, a cup run or even a single game in a decade can remind you why you put yourself through it week in week out and you forget a lot of the rubbish.
we have these odd seasons or special games about once in ten years, one of my particular favourites was a game we didn't even win(but perhaps should have) beaten by Gazzas Tottenham in the cup, i still to this day get goosebumps when Don O'riordan turned the script on its head and put us in front with a worldy and i can vividly recall the travelling down,scarves out of what seemed like every car window on the M1, the excitement getting to see their team full of internationals listed in the programme and even the tears at the end make for very happy memories.

You'd be surprised how much you fall back in love with football if you manage to have a good season,getting a promotion at wembley in the playoffs beats anything i've seen of the PL, a civic reception in the town centre,open top bus parade the pride comes flooding back even if it isn't for very long you just take those odd moments of joy and treasure them forever.

[upthemaggies]

If ever you begin to think that football doesn't matter anymore, just re-watch that Wrexham bootlegger video at Kidderminster. It's unreal drama. Love the moment at 22:45ish where the supporter walks calmly onto the pitch and sits down in the goalmouth to protest.

https://youtu.be/tybadL985uc?t=1316

[countygump]

If ever you begin to think that football doesn't matter anymore, just re-watch that Wrexham bootlegger video at Kidderminster. It's unreal drama. Love the moment at 22:45ish where the supporter walks calmly onto the pitch and sits down in the goalmouth to protest.

https://youtu.be/tybadL985uc?t=1316

He's one strange dude is that bootlegger!!! He did a quicky on us as well.




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