That's how I feel about supporting Ipswich at the moment. I'm bored of seeing Marcus Evans' name on our shirt.. I'm bored of selling our best assets and not using the generated income on replacements I'm bored of seeing the same players in the starting eleven regardless of form. I'm bored of having a faceless owner who never has anything to say to the supporters. I'm bored of having non-football people running the club. I'm bored of Mick and his football philosophy. Watching the Forest match after work on Saturday evening, for the first time I actually started thinking "What am I doing this for?" It was a terrible game and I was so frustrated watching it that I almost turned it off. I didn't. It was not enjoyable at all. I spent most of my time screaming at the TV, not good for the heart rate at all (or my marriage for that matter) I thought to myself "If I was doing something that was not enjoyable, would I do it again?" Probably not would be the answer, unless for family reasons I guess. That's just it though, a football club is like that, a family. A drug that I'm addicted to that keeps me coming back for more. But like a junkie who's not getting a buzz from his fix anymore, what's the point? It's the hope isn't it? The hope that things will get better. The hope of being entertained. The hope of wearing your shirt with pride, chest puffed out and swaggering about after a great match. Trouble is, I don't have much hope that things will get better. I find myself hoping for Marcus to sell up, hoping for Mick to leave the club, hoping for something to be proud of, like our play off year. We all felt good then. Even though I live 5495 miles away was I any less embarrassed seeing all the empty seats in the stadium, the football on display? No, I wasn't. I care about our club. I take the time to educate people about ITFC. I have friends here in San Diego that check our results, know where we are in the table, give me stick when we're doing badly. So I want change, from top to bottom. There will be those that say be careful what you wish for, Marcus saved our club etc,etc. Did he? Did he save our club? He seems to be strangling the life out of it if you ask me. All I see is a businessman who bought a large debt for a small fee and is now charging interest on it. I doubt there are many other football clubs in debt that pay interest to the owner. I mean talk about crippling yourself from the inside. It's insane. He seems to be running the club into the ground, a front for the rest of his empire, a deficit to offset other accounts. What other reason could there be? He doesn't seem to care about the supporters, the ticket pricing, the quality of football on offer. Basically everything that should concern you as a football club owner. So I want to see change. Change the owner. Change the manager. Change the name on our shirt. Change the way I feel about Ipswich Town Football Club! And don't worry, I'll still be getting up at 06:35am to tune in to the match, in the hope of something. We are family after all.
Good stuff SD, I think most of us feel the same way, I would be happy for now if our owner came out with a statement regarding his intentions for the Club in the near future and beyond, as a season ticket holder who therefore invests in the Club I would like some indication of where the owner is taking ITFC and how he proposes to achieve this, I won't hold my breath.
And that would be a good start FM. There's just no direction for the club at the moment apart from running the first team on a budget. I admire you and all other ST holders for sticking with it, it's a tough period. But as I said above, we're all family and will still be together after all this is over I decided to submit the above to TWTD for a blog. It needed some revisions to get it published but it should be going up soon.
I think you put the point better than I did SD, the Club appears to be drifting rudderless in a sea of indifference and certainly deaf to the concerns of the fans, but the owner could reassure fans with a statement and actually show he is actively involved in the development of the Club and the targets he has in mind. All this reclusive b/S is all very theatrical but shows ME as being someone removed from the Club rather than in the middle of it being involved and as concerned as we are about situation we are in, so come on ME lead from the front, show us you're involved, communicate with the fans, and stop this reclusive nonsense.
