Let’s go to away games and home games. That’ll make a positive difference.
Let me preface this by saying that I agree with what Push The Boundary (PTB), the protest group formed a couple of years back by fans of Oldham Athletic, are trying to achieve.
The club is in the doldrums, plumbing the depths of League Two, English football’s basement division, having in living memory graced major cup finals and semi finals, and even the Premier League.
I agree with their aims — to try and do something about the situation. I want a team that wins, too, a team we can be proud of. And I understand the sentiment to protest, even though I’ve grown older in the years since I took part in Stop The Rot protests.
I also don’t think we gain from different fan groups with different opinions, disagreeing with each other — again despite writing this! What I hope is that PTB can emphasise the real good in their proposal, and perhaps quietly shelve what I think is the bad in it. But even if they can’t, I still respect their right to protest and do something about the situation.
The latest protest measure, after a popular petition attracting almost 3,000 signatures, is to boycott home matches, and only attend away matches — Away Days, or Everywhere We Go. It’s a clear effort to rally and encourage away attendance. That bit of the idea I can get behind and I think is great, but I can’t agree with the encouragement to boycott home matches.
PTB have professed they don’t wish to negatively affect the team, only protest at the regime. As they write here, they ‘back the team, but not the regime’.
But that’s a statement that is just not in any way consistent with this protest. Boycotting home matches obviously negatively affects the team — they won’t have our support at home matches. The last 18 months of football without fans has made that abundantly clear. And there’s load of evidence out there now. As if we didn’t need the evidence of last season — the club’s worst ever home record whilst we recorded one of our best ever away campaigns.
The players (and staff) may well be less likely to receive their wages if the club is starved, as is clearly the aim, of cash with which to pay them (PTB suggest that fans only buy tickets at the stadium of away teams when going to away matches: “Turning up and paying on the day means that only the home side will receive any gate receipts so we would therefore not be funding the current regime”).
That also has to affect the team, although for me it’s a secondary and less important effect than the first one. The most important one is that we don’t affect the team sufficiently badly that our League status is put into doubt.
More broadly, and this is just personal opinion (and I’m not rich!), I don’t think such a protest makes the point to a potential new owner that this might be a club they wish to invest in. PTB write that doing this will “showcase the amazing support we have to any potential suitors”.
I don’t think this is the case. I think it acts as a warning to a new owner. Don’t do the things we want, and this is how we’ll act. Any new owner is considering spending a non-trivial proportion of his or her fortune on this club, and I struggle to think that fans willing to take steps like this that will harm the team and club will be attractive to a potentially owner.
I’m also aware that clubs that have engaged in these kinds of protests (e.g. Blackpool) have ended up with new owners, so I know it is possible. I just think on balance, better new owners are more likely if we are better as fans towards our team. These are all low probability events, sadly.
I think there’s a lot of good in this initiative that should be emphasised. The steps proposed to encourage fans to attend away matches are the great. Directions for fans, arranging travel, guides for places to meet, eat and drink, and ideas to meet socially.
This is great! This is what an “amazing support”, or “the best support in the country”, does. It marks us out.
A club in the doldrums, yet with a passionate, loyal fanbase whose support for the team is unconditional.
A fanbase willing to put aside its objections with the current owners to make its support for the team, for those eleven men (plus subs) who pull on our jersey each week.
A fanbase wholeheartedly supporting its team, but making its point about the owners — sit ins, marches, petitions, all sorts of other protests outside the 90 minutes the team is in action.
A fanbase prepared to take active, positive steps to make us look better to potential investors.
That kind of fanbase is attractive to potential investors, surely. That’s something that a wealthy individual, or consortium, would be more willing to invest in. I think.
