Lovefool: The fraying relationship between a club and its fanbase

A saddened Terry after reading this

Elliott Wheat-Bowen, Hurt by Huddersfield Town
Twitter: @elliotthtafc

The biggest challenge facing this football club right now is not relegation and a return to the third flight of English football after a nine-year jaunt to the Championship and above, but the loss of large swathes of the fanbase.

So much good work was done to rebuild the fanbase on a coalition of fronts. Work in the Asian community brought a multicultural blend to the fanbase which matched the make-up of the town. Further work in the wider community saw the next generation inspired to follow Town, but also an effort was made to reach out to those who had fallen out of love and they too were brought back into the fold. We were made countless promises and they said all the right things, now… we’re questioning why we were such fools to believe that it’d be different this time.

Valentine’s Day has just passed and the relationship between the fanbase and the club is very much on the rocks. Phil et al. may have lazily thrown some flowers in our direction and stood outside our window playing music and begging for a second chance, but after the trauma of being relegated from the Premier League, we expected different. We deserved better.

Reflecting on that final season in the Premier League, the support was unrelenting. Some of it was self-deprecating, for others it was a shout of defiance. However, when we were relegated, we were made promises and told we have the foundations and a legacy for a brighter future and we believed them – or some of us did. We were told that the pain we were feeling now would be worth it in the long run. The embarrassment and humiliation of being one of the worst teams in Premier League history, it would be water under the bridge because we would not return to where we had begun before David Wagner ran onto the scene and swept us off our feet.

Yet here we are, in a worse place than when we’d started. Not only have they fallen back into their old ways, but they’ve also picked up some incredibly unhealthy habits along the way. The unhealthiest of habits being perennial failure and a well-ingrained losing mentality which has so clearly rotted to the very core of this club. The only solution is a scorched earth policy, burning it to the ground and start again. Instead, if the rumours are to be true, throwing Ravel Morrison into an already combustible dressing room would be the equivalent of taking a flamethrower into a gunpowder factory.

I’m hearing the same arguments in favour of self-inflicted relegation to League 1 as I did for lying down and accepting relegation from the Premier League. Unfortunately, unless you have a plan in place and a pilot who can control a plane that is spiralling nose-first into the floor, you’re probably going to end up crashing and burning.

We’ve returned to the infuriatingly small-minded attitude of we can’t compete; I would love to know why we can’t compete; the beauty of the Championship is that everyone can compete. It’s not quite a true meritocracy. Of course, those with the best squads and the best resources rise to the top, but it’s much closer to a meritocracy than the Premier League is.

Well-run clubs or clubs with a finite vision have a chance too. Unfortunately, clubs who are continually changing personnel at all levels of the club which results in inexperience across the board – including the actual board, as well as the implementation of a scattergun approach to recruitment, which would’ve been better suited for the previous pair of managers, doesn’t set the club up for success, believe it or not.

Beyond being told that there is a ceiling to what we can achieve, even though we’ve experienced first hand that’s not the case, there is a breakdown in communication. How can a relationship work if we don’t feel like we’re listened to? All we want is to be wined and dined and be made to feel we’re special. Instead, we’re watching us drop a two-goal lead to Wycombe and watching Lewis O’Brien drowning from being so out of his depth at left-back.

We’re being talked to. We’re being told our opinion matters, that they understand where we’re coming from. They’re holding our hand and nodding gently, but they’re not really listening. Either that or they’re so set in their ways that it doesn’t matter how we feel.

Pushing out a carefully worded statement once a month with no means of reply or scrutiny or accountability, doesn’t constitute as communication, it barely constitutes as information. I have a degree in political science, I won’t bore you for long, but that statement screamed of a politician who was under fire. Read it back and you’ll see, information is drip-fed throughout it, just enough for you to think – well maybe they’ve seen the error of their ways and now they’re making an effort to reverse the damage. However, if you look closely at the admissions made, a lot of them are either already in the public arena or it’s worded so deliberately and vaguely that it’s nothing more than a baseless empty gesture.

Ultimately, that’s where the crux of the matter lies, every good relationship is built on a foundation of trust. No matter how much communication is thrown our way, if the trust just isn’t there then the sincerest of sentiments will be called out as bluster. This is the biggest challenge facing the club, restoring trust between the fans and the club and in all truth, I don’t see how it is done. There have been too many bridges burnt and the disconnect and apathy have spread like wildfire and there isn’t enough experience and know-how in the senior management positions of this club to know how to douse those fires.

For too long, this has been a one-way relationship. We give our full devotion and wear our heart on our sleeve, we go out of our way to give our full support and in return, we get nothing in return – I lie, we get a video of Tommy Smith’s winner against Rotherham from fifteen different angles.

There’s an easy response to this, yeah but if Town were winning matches, you wouldn’t feel like this. Meh, devotion and affinity and strength of bond doesn’t necessarily equate with success on the pitch, it helps but it’s not a prerequisite. In this relationship, we’ve been strung along, we’ve been given broken promises and they’ve continuously under-delivered. All we wanted is the feeling to be mutual and for them to show that they care, but it feels like this current regime doesn’t give a damn about us.  

Fans are fed up, and rightly so.

 Sponsored by Magic Rock Brewing

Use Takesthatchance10 for 10% off online orders!