Mea Culpa?
13/04/05 | by Alastair Gunn

Relegation is inevitable and the faintest shimmer of silver lining is detectable only to the most perceptively blind of eyes: at least ticket prices will be down next season! Of course, knowing our board, even such mild optimism may be foolhardy and harks back with knowing scepticism to a previous false dawn of copious irony. I talk, of course, of the most mocking of questions which stiffened the throat even then: “We’re serious about promotion! Are you?”

Well, to hell with it! We knew even then promotion was hardly the ambition of a board whose summer trinket was Kris Commons. The board were never serious and nor were the players. And who could blame them with supporters like us? Us paltry folk who only ever mustered crowds of never more than 28,887 and with tickets as cheap as economy caviar to boot! Who could play for a club so bereft of support that they have to resort to asking “Are you serious about promotion?” Who could support a club so bereft of a semblance of anything praiseworthy that they have to ask?

Yes, the question is rhetorical and the answer is, me. Oh the ass I am to have been born away from a heaving city, shot through by crime and riddled with young footballing talent – it makes you weep.

A city like London would I have preferred, where I could have supported Arsenal, Tottenham, unfashionable Chelsea or even plucky Wimbledon. A metropolis so cultured as Liverpool, with a two-fold choice of tails-I-win and heads-ain’t-bad-as-a-second-bet. The bright glare of the police search lights of Manchester; why was I not born to thee, O citadel of Sir Alec?

Pity me, the mere child of Nottingham, a humble town of modest taste. Where crime knows not its own name, where never a graceful footballer wailed a first breath. Where simple folk ask no more than to not be troubled by lofty ambitions of success, pride or promotion and where simple folk know their place. Respect for me? Why no! That would be greedy. What could a simpleton like me, the mere child of Nottingham, want with a little respect?

So rage no longer, dear brethren. We are only a small, rural set. How on earth could a petty little place like Nottingham expect to sustain a successful football club? Were we ever serious about promotion? No! Did we pour millions into the club? No! Did we return in our thousands in support week in, week out, week in, week out? No! Did we sing proudly when all before was forlorn and hopeless, crestfallen and humiliated? No!

Yes we are a small city, far too small to host a proper club. We are unconcerned supporters, all for the spirit of the game and not a jot do we care about winning or losing. We are lucky to have our team, lucky to have our board, luck to have the club. It’s more than we deserve!

So spare a thought, dear reader, for those poor, grey men who serve this club. Those men of ambition, of spirit, of lusty gung-ho. If it were not for us, us who doubted promotion, us who had not even thought of promotion, us who were not serious about promotion from start to finish… if it were not for us then maybe we would be serious about promotion even now.

Yes, dear reader, we were the yolk around the poor oxen’s neck, weighing it down. I spit upon my own shameful face in knowledge that I, the fans, were not there when my club needed me most. We let you down.

So I, the fans, plead shamefully guilty of letting this club down. And let these bilious words serve as testament to that shame. Let me forever more wander through this self-caused excrement in loathsome contemplation that when they were serious about promotion, I ask myself this question. Was I?

Mea culpa, Nottingham. Mea culpa.