As supporters do we actually support?
As supporters are we ever happy? Reading this and a couple of other message boards, it appears we are only truly happy when we have something to whinge about. This was most in evidence on Saturday, where several people around me were moaning and groaning about players, management and owners, despite the team winning, the sun shining and, as far as I’m aware, they were all season ticket holders and thus not affected by the recent ticket price rises.
Now I know that when it comes to my team I am probably a glass half full person, rather than a glass half empty person, so I had a tendency to disagree with much of what was being shouted out by these guys. But what effected me was the vitriol and hatred that went along with it. This wasn’t just “geddim off” (although that was shouted about 10 times by one bloke at Peter Ramage even though I thought he had a half decent game), it was the full spittle at the corner of the mouth anger.
I thought the Paladini regime had divided supporters and that our new mega rich owners (even if they are slightly less rich than they were last month) would help reunite us – our future being secure, money being spent on and off the pitch and for the first time in years there was optimism about. It has taken less than 2 months of the new season for that to change.
We seem to be very divided supporters, and that division is obviously coming across to the players as Ainsworth and Rowly as the two senior players have both called for us to get behind the team, and more recently Tim Flowers has repeated that call. As supporters we have to take some of the blame for ruining Zesh Rehman’s career. Are we now trying to do the same with Ramage and Cerny? 3 minutes into the latter’s is all it took for some morons to chant Lee Camp’s name. To my mind we should 100% support the players in hoops (or proxy hoops in the case of the keeper) once they cross the white line. Others seem to go with the attitude that our new found wealth means we should be playing the Champions League in 18 months time or it’s a failure, and we’ll boo loudly if we don’t get there.
Don’t get me wrong – Im not denying our right to boo – especially at the odious Cashley Hole, but the events of Saturday were not like that. Was it a great performance? No, but it certainly wasn’t bad either, and not one player deserved booing, and yet that’s what we got from some sections of the crowd.
Like them or loathe them, you can’t deny that teams like Liverpool have a 12th man in the stands – they get behind their team, sometimes even more so if they have just conceded. Our bunch tend to react to what is on the field rather than influence it. Then whinge about it on the message boards when they get home…
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