Loyalty, perserverence, blind support for the trials and tribulations of the team we love

Sport is not everyone's cup of Darjeeling. I know some lovely people - perfectly sane and rational people - who have absolutely no interest in sporting endeavour. They are passionate about other things, and they don't seem to be lacking in their lives for want of following a football team (for example - and this blog is about following a football team).

I have been an Arsenal fan since I was about 4. That's a long time, believe me. Aged eight I was a season ticket holder at Leicester City (my home town club) and whilst I supported that team wholeheartedly (Keith Weller, Alan Birchenall, Frankie Worthington, Dennis Rofe et al) when I was there (except when they were playing Arsenal), I never once switched allegiance.

Dynamo Sammels we called him, a former Arsenal player (right). It was ironic. 

Frankie Worthington scored some memorable goals and was a real character

I remember distinctly sitting (every home game) next to a really nice woman who had a pony tail and who knew I was a Gooner (you chat without any kind of candour when you're eight) and who, if Arsenal were playing against Leicester City in those days, would smile knowingly when I sat down next to her. And if Arsenal scored I would keep quiet because I was in the Double Decker Stand at Filbert Street, the Leicester end of the ground with my Grandad.

And she would quietly nudge me, and wink.

I used to go with my Grandad, but sometimes he wasn't well enough to go, so I'd take my best mate Dean from across the road. We'd turn up with my kid's ticket and my Grandad's pensioner's ticket (both of us were eight and feeling very grown up to be going to a match on our own).

Today the ticket people would probably say 'I'm sorry this is not a valid ticket you can't come in', but in those days (maybe I'm maligning today's crop of officials), they had a field day. 'Hey Bert, look at this guy! He's 72. (this was Dean aged eight). He looks good on it though. What's your secret old man? ' They used to 'help us' up the stairs and ask poor Dean if he wanted a blanket over his legs because it was a bit cold. 

We nearly died of embarrassment, but it was always well-meant and friendly.

It was not easy to be an Arsenal fan in those days if your mum was a terrible clothes washer, which mine was, and I'm delighted to say still is. I'd get my new Arsenal shirt for Christmas; sleep in it obviously, for a week or so, and in between I'd be out playing in it with the other kids. I was always either Jon Radford or, preferably, Charlie George.

And then, when the shirt could stand up on its own with the combination of mud and sweat, my mum would grab a hold of it and wash it. On a high temperature.

And so, from mid January until my birthday in August, I'd have pink sleeves. Where the red of the shirt had run into the sleeves.

Now these days with the Glenn McGrath Foundation, Cantona etc, pink is sometimes a sign of confidence in one's own masculinity. At the age of ten, in 1975, that wasn't quite the case.

 And apart from my 'cultured' left foot (I was and am, right footed), I was a striker at play, but a left back, left winger or 'sweeper' playing for the school or local teenage side. Eventually I found my niche in goal and became a 'keeper' at football and cricket. 

So apart from my Arsenal heroes, I was also looking out for great keepers of the time including Joe Corrigan at Citeh, Peter Bonetti at Chel$ki etc.

Heady days.

So, what with living in the wrong place and having pink sleeves, it's not been an easy ride for me, being a Gooner. But it has been wonderful nonetheless. I think being a Gooner has been complete value for money, time and OK I'll say it, 'love' over the years. And it's this belief that has made me encourage my son Angus to follow me in that direction. When he texts me (he's at Uni in Leicester now) "#COYG" before a game I know I've done some good in the world!

I've been privileged to see some of the best players ever to have played the game, wearing an Arsenal shirt. Charlie George (whose goal in the 1971 FA Cup final started it all for me); Malcolm MacDonald, Liam Brady, Alan Ball, Tony Adams, Patrick Vieira, Robert Pirés: There are many many others. And, truly in my opinion, two of the best players of all time in Dennis Bergkamp and Thierry Henry.

Arsenal don't win everything, far from it. There have been many dark days over the years. And those dark days make the successes much more valuable in my opinion. But being an Arsenal fan comes with some responsibilities too. Generally speaking, and in my humble opinion, it means supporting the team and its players without compromise.

It means accepting defeat - being angry about it - but understanding that the club and the team and the players and management are trying their best. That they want what we do.

It's also about being 'classy' in a difficult to define way. I tend to think - probably naively - that we tend to respect other teams a bit more and that we tend to want to win fairly and to do the right thing if we can. We tend to be against the current 'money bags' regimes that are coming
into football having tried to earn the right to compete through good management.

But that, sadly, is the way of the world and commercialism is taking over.

We have no right, really, to be able to compete with the unlimited budgets of the new Chelski or Man Citeh set-ups. But this year at least, we seem to be doing so.

We've just been stuffed by a very good Liverpool side. The wheels are falling off. Again. What strikes me is not the reaction of the new, younger Gooners, brought up in a 'must-have it all now' world and who think we have a divine right to win everything. And who, halfway through a thrashing today, want to sack a manager who has had us top of the league for most of the time during a season that has been the most competitive for years.

I just smile and shake my head at their antics on twitter. Being a fan is about the long haul, taking the rough with the smooth, the great with the good and the not so good. They'll learn - or go off and support Chelski or whoever.

No. What strikes me is the older, dyed in the wool fans like me who, unlike me, have the same harsh, judgmental approach. Every missed chance is a disaster. Every draw is a chance missed (which of course it is). Every defeat is like a death in the family. Every misplaced pass identifies the culprit as not being worthy of wearing the shirt. I don't share that approach, and this started out as a blog that would seek to admonish those people, but the fact is that it's what makes the game so compelling. Part of what I love about it all. So tribal. So important as Bill Shankley famously said. And he was right.

I love the passion, but I think many people are completely unrealistic and it saddens me to see long-standing 'fans' hurling personal abuse at players and the manager when things aren't going to plan. This is sport, it will never go to plan all of the time. The triumphs are all the more precious when they are achieved against adversity. Hounding out potentially great players (like Gervinho for example) saddens me.

But that's just my personal opinion. I think we're all on the same side really, but sometimes it doesn't feel like it.

I had a good bottle of Champagne on ice the night we played in the Champion's League final. I planned to share it with colleagues at a meeting the following morning. It's still in the fridge. But it will come out some day.

It might not be this year, but it's getting better in the bottle as we speak. 

Thanks for reading. COYG!