A fans view on Portsmouth's situation - a cracking read
Fri Aug 03, 2012 1:09 am
Four years ago Pompey were celebrating an FA Cup triumph. In 15 days they face oblivion, a fate I didn't envisage when I began supporting the club 20 years ago
I have been attending games at Fratton Park since 1992. As a child, I took it for granted that the club would always be there. As an adult, I didn't envisage the 20th year of my support for a team I've held dear for so long potentially ending in a disaster of this magnitude. Because, make no mistake about it, this could be the end game.
The future of the club I and many thousands of others have supported over generations now lies in the hands of a few footballers who have been asked to waive the wages they're legally entitled to for the sake of saving the focal point of an entire city. There is an irony that for so many years players at Portsmouth have decided the direction the club took on the pitch, yet now they will decide which direction it takes off it.
It is League One, with yet another 10-point deduction, or the wall. It's down to them. One of their number is the much-decorated and previously heralded N****wo Kanu, he of the FA Cup final winning goal in 2008. He is now reportedly demanding £3m. Never at Portsmouth has a hero travelled that rocky road to zero so effectively.
Instinctively though, I find myself siding with the players who signed contracts in good faith and now expect to be paid. While football isn't really like any other industry, that contract is nonetheless still legally binding unless the beneficiary agrees to a mutual termination. Yes, footballers are paid handsomely, some arguably too handsomely (no one could feasibly argue that Tal Ben Haim is worth a reported £36,000 a week), but it's a short career and they need to protect themselves and their families. They know they'll be a long time retired.
But unfortunately, to fall on the players' side of the fence in this instance is to miss the point entirely. It's gone beyond that. If the club doesn't reduce its wage bill, neither Balram Chainrai's Portpin nor the Portsmouth Supporters' Trust can rescue Portsmouth and there will be no club. In that scenario, the players in question holding out so stubbornly for their money would likely receive nothing anyway. Sadly for them, they will be out of pocket whichever way the dust settles.
And what would the rest of us lose? Well, anyone who's attended a game down on the south coast is unlikely to forget it. As far as I'm concerned the atmosphere is completely unique – a combination of adverse weather and hardy souls with loud singing voices makes for a heady mix. Even if the football doesn't always give you much to remember, the atmosphere within the stadium and that ripping wind off the Solent certainly will. On a more serious note, in a city that has felt the full force of the recession in recent months as well as a scaling-back of jobs in both the dockyard and the town centre itself, it seems grossly unfair that the football club, a welcome hobby and distraction for many, many residents in straitened times is going through such turmoil. Part of the beauty of supporting your team is the escapism that it provides, the solace on a Saturday afternoon and the entertainment and camaraderie with your fellow fan. The fact that the majority of this time has recently been spent worrying about whether there will be a club left to support is a mini-tragedy in itself.
The very notion of a huge, gaping hole where the club once was is unpalatable in the extreme. Despite the occasional blind eye being turned, this isn't the fault of supporters. This is a situation that should speak to fans the length and breadth of the country. With unscrupulous owners and financial irresponsibility becoming more and more commonplace, this could happen to any football fan. Every football fan.
If there is a silver lining to any of this, it is the actions of the aforementioned Portsmouth Supporters' Trust, who have managed to raise a barely believable seven-figure sum exclusively from donations and, should the players and their representatives come to an agreement with the administrator, are now in a position to make a serious bid for the club. The idea of Portsmouth being owned by a fan group is like a boulder being lifted from one's chest. Pompey may not compete at the highest level ever again, but we'll be governed by a group of people with the club's best interests at heart. I genuinely can't remember the last time I was able to say that and honestly believe it. I hope that glimmer of light they're providing, no matter how small, can grow bright enough to warm us and rescue us from this footballing hypothermia.
Ultimately, this predicament isn't about what's fair and what isn't. This is about a series of decisions made by a small group of people, with no outside regulation, that could effectively destroy 114 years of history. There have been tumultuous times in the past involving Portsmouth; the club narrowly avoided liquidation in 1976 by selling on a lot of the playing staff at the 11th hour; in the 1990s one particular news story that stuck in the craw featured the players being forced to wash and reuse their jockstraps as the club was unable to afford new ones. I discovered as a teenager that if the first casualty of war was truth, by supporting Portsmouth it was occasionally dignity.
Through a combination of the club being batted around like an old tennis ball from owner to owner and the lack of serious regulation within the game, it seems no lesson has been learned. It is now vital that realisation dawns on what is literally a matter of life and death for this grand old institution sitting proudly on Portsea Island.
The focus must be on saving this club from extinction. Only afterwards should there be a concentrated effort by all football fans, in conjunction with the excellent Football Supporters' Federation, to lobby the FA to make sure this can never happen to Portsmouth or any other club ever again. The clock is ticking on that deadline of 10 August. It's going to be a long couple of weeks.
On a personal note, I feel awfully sad for Pompey fans, this could of been us guys, how close we came.
---------
Even though we have had a massive rivalry over the years with them can't help but feel sorry for most of their fans.
I have been attending games at Fratton Park since 1992. As a child, I took it for granted that the club would always be there. As an adult, I didn't envisage the 20th year of my support for a team I've held dear for so long potentially ending in a disaster of this magnitude. Because, make no mistake about it, this could be the end game.
The future of the club I and many thousands of others have supported over generations now lies in the hands of a few footballers who have been asked to waive the wages they're legally entitled to for the sake of saving the focal point of an entire city. There is an irony that for so many years players at Portsmouth have decided the direction the club took on the pitch, yet now they will decide which direction it takes off it.
It is League One, with yet another 10-point deduction, or the wall. It's down to them. One of their number is the much-decorated and previously heralded N****wo Kanu, he of the FA Cup final winning goal in 2008. He is now reportedly demanding £3m. Never at Portsmouth has a hero travelled that rocky road to zero so effectively.
Instinctively though, I find myself siding with the players who signed contracts in good faith and now expect to be paid. While football isn't really like any other industry, that contract is nonetheless still legally binding unless the beneficiary agrees to a mutual termination. Yes, footballers are paid handsomely, some arguably too handsomely (no one could feasibly argue that Tal Ben Haim is worth a reported £36,000 a week), but it's a short career and they need to protect themselves and their families. They know they'll be a long time retired.
But unfortunately, to fall on the players' side of the fence in this instance is to miss the point entirely. It's gone beyond that. If the club doesn't reduce its wage bill, neither Balram Chainrai's Portpin nor the Portsmouth Supporters' Trust can rescue Portsmouth and there will be no club. In that scenario, the players in question holding out so stubbornly for their money would likely receive nothing anyway. Sadly for them, they will be out of pocket whichever way the dust settles.
And what would the rest of us lose? Well, anyone who's attended a game down on the south coast is unlikely to forget it. As far as I'm concerned the atmosphere is completely unique – a combination of adverse weather and hardy souls with loud singing voices makes for a heady mix. Even if the football doesn't always give you much to remember, the atmosphere within the stadium and that ripping wind off the Solent certainly will. On a more serious note, in a city that has felt the full force of the recession in recent months as well as a scaling-back of jobs in both the dockyard and the town centre itself, it seems grossly unfair that the football club, a welcome hobby and distraction for many, many residents in straitened times is going through such turmoil. Part of the beauty of supporting your team is the escapism that it provides, the solace on a Saturday afternoon and the entertainment and camaraderie with your fellow fan. The fact that the majority of this time has recently been spent worrying about whether there will be a club left to support is a mini-tragedy in itself.
The very notion of a huge, gaping hole where the club once was is unpalatable in the extreme. Despite the occasional blind eye being turned, this isn't the fault of supporters. This is a situation that should speak to fans the length and breadth of the country. With unscrupulous owners and financial irresponsibility becoming more and more commonplace, this could happen to any football fan. Every football fan.
If there is a silver lining to any of this, it is the actions of the aforementioned Portsmouth Supporters' Trust, who have managed to raise a barely believable seven-figure sum exclusively from donations and, should the players and their representatives come to an agreement with the administrator, are now in a position to make a serious bid for the club. The idea of Portsmouth being owned by a fan group is like a boulder being lifted from one's chest. Pompey may not compete at the highest level ever again, but we'll be governed by a group of people with the club's best interests at heart. I genuinely can't remember the last time I was able to say that and honestly believe it. I hope that glimmer of light they're providing, no matter how small, can grow bright enough to warm us and rescue us from this footballing hypothermia.
Ultimately, this predicament isn't about what's fair and what isn't. This is about a series of decisions made by a small group of people, with no outside regulation, that could effectively destroy 114 years of history. There have been tumultuous times in the past involving Portsmouth; the club narrowly avoided liquidation in 1976 by selling on a lot of the playing staff at the 11th hour; in the 1990s one particular news story that stuck in the craw featured the players being forced to wash and reuse their jockstraps as the club was unable to afford new ones. I discovered as a teenager that if the first casualty of war was truth, by supporting Portsmouth it was occasionally dignity.
Through a combination of the club being batted around like an old tennis ball from owner to owner and the lack of serious regulation within the game, it seems no lesson has been learned. It is now vital that realisation dawns on what is literally a matter of life and death for this grand old institution sitting proudly on Portsea Island.
The focus must be on saving this club from extinction. Only afterwards should there be a concentrated effort by all football fans, in conjunction with the excellent Football Supporters' Federation, to lobby the FA to make sure this can never happen to Portsmouth or any other club ever again. The clock is ticking on that deadline of 10 August. It's going to be a long couple of weeks.
On a personal note, I feel awfully sad for Pompey fans, this could of been us guys, how close we came.
---------
Even though we have had a massive rivalry over the years with them can't help but feel sorry for most of their fans.