FROTHING MAD

Printed in the Southern Premier League game v Paulton Town on Saturday 17th October 2015. We won 2-1 in front of 244

I can handle most things life throws at me but a tame defeat in the FA Cup and I’ve got a face like a slapped arse, looking for a cat to kick, grumbling on twitter and frothing on the train as the seats around me become vacant.

Football fans are impossible to please. It's never quite just right. We want immediate gratification and never ending success. We are like little kids waking at 4am demanding to open our Christmas presents. Spoilt brats with terrible temper tantrums.

The other Saturday I went to a stadium that is so near my house, I can cycle to it 10 minutes – even quicker if there were weren't so many bloody football fans getting in the way. The crowd of 26,000 in Brighton's swanky stadium is no doubt going to be more than the total attendance of all the games I go to this year. Brighton are top of the Championship and on this display are heading to the Promised Land of fixtures being switched at short notice, eye-watering admission prices and being told endlessly like some North Korean dictate that they are in the best league in the world. I have never seen such a one-sided 1-1 draw as the Albion played Cardiff off the park. It could easily have been 6-1 and at the death, a player missed what looked like a sitter. Reading their forums afterwards you'd never guess they were not only top of the league but the only football league club not to have lost a game yet, playing fantastic, intelligent football. Two points dropped! End of the world! We need another striker!

When Slough recently went on a five game losing run, the forum came alive with the question 'can you comment on a game you've not been at?' Slough had been beaten 3-0 by second in the table Leamington, recently relegated from the Conference South. It seemed, we had let ourselves down badly by some defensive mistakes and an offside goal. But the fightback in the second half led those that were there to praise the team effort. 'Did it get us any points' those frothing on their keyboards blubbered? Well no, but I don't know about you, but commenting on a game you weren't at, or just following on twitter or Rebels Radio is a bit like commenting on a book you've just read a review of. As Staines Rebel Junior said “Having listening to a lot of radio last year and having actually been on it a few times this year I can tell you it is incredibly difficult to put over exactly how the team are doing and how each individual player is doing. Basing your analysis of the game solely on twitter or the radio is nothing like basing it on being there for real.”

I want the team I support to put in a shift. Something I felt we hadn't done against Basingstoke who were ripe for one of those cliched FA Cup upsets.

One of my best days supporting the Rebels was when we lost 9-0 to AFC Wimbledon which sealed our relegation. Why? Because of the support for a team who all season were on a hiding to nothing with the club in serious trouble. It was backs-against-the-wall look-on-the-bright side-of-life stuff. And I’ve never had a womble bow to me before.

Lewes fans are also on the warpath, sick of five seasons of dross. Yes, they know they have one of the best marketed clubs in the land, yes they are a community club ticking all the right boxes and going about things in a sensible, sustainable manner. But fans want to see their first time play some decent football and get a win. Which is understandable, and I thank my lucky stars I don't have to put up watching them at the moment week in week out. But one fan completely crossed the line accusing one of the (volunteer) directors of having his snout in the trough. Trough full of what?

I know its hard (but easy after 3 league wins on the bounce for Slough fans) but we do all need a reality check sometimes. See how we can get involved to make our club better. We wont all agree, but what we do need to do, as supporters of Slough Town is get behind the team when it really matters. When the game is on. Let's leave the frothing on the top of our beer.