FC United : Saints or Devils?

There was something disconcerting about FC United of Manchester’s televised game at Rochdale on Friday evening. At first I couldn’t put my finger on it. My first instinct was that I would love the newly formed club to succeed. After all, FCUM share my ideas of football as the centre of a community, they have to be admired for the way they rejected the star-spangled atmosphere of Old Trafford in favour of a more intimate and accessible football experience. And yet….something didn’t ring true. Then it happened, and the penny dropped.

Rochdale scored their second goal to equalise late in the game. After coming so close to an unbelievable fairy-tale ending, the FCUM fans would be devasted, gutted, heartbroken. But no, they hardly paused for breath as they continued with their incessant upbeat array of songs. They were so God-damn happy-clappy.  I recognised their sentiments immediately. They were second-club emotions. I’ve been there. I’ve felt like that.

When Sam Hammam took over my club Cardiff City in 2000, I didn’t like it. I resigned my position at Ninian Park within a few months of witnessing at first hand his philosophy and methodology. His influence was immense and I just couldn’t relate to the way that the club started to behave. Very much like the FCUM supporters I withdrew my support from the regime, and entered a strange period where every club win was tinged with the unhappy knowledge that Hammam was on the way to achieving his aims. I fought a long internal battle where I would sometimes decide to fight and hold on to the club I knew, and others when I just thought “sod it, I can’t watch them while he’s in charge”.

This period coincided with the birth of my first son, and like FCUM I decided to find other avenues of football, partly for logistical reasons. I started to follow Bangor City whenever they played in South Wales. I had some connections with the club, and a vague intention of relocating to the Bangor area in the future.

It was great. I spent a lot of Saturdays on the road with my son and we visited some lovely parts of the country and met some good people. We wore Bangor City shirts and very much enjoyed the time. I was envious of those with stronger connections to the club – they lived for their team and celebrated a goal at Haverfordwest with the same gusto that Cardiff fans celebrated at Bristol.

I cheered too. I sung the songs. I felt a sense of pride when they won. But did you notice that? I called them “they”. Even though I was covering miles and miles and was more committed than many Bangor fans, I just couldn’t bring myself to call them “we”. They weren’t really my team. When Bangor conceded a late equaliser, I tried to be gutted, but I wasn’t. I was mildly irritated, but hey, look at the scenery. Life’s good.

And that’s the impression I got from FCUM. They accepted that second goal too readily. It didn’t hurt them enough. I felt that FCUM was just a passing amusement. Football on a Friday night – time for a few pints and a pitch invasion. They were patronising Rochdale. They were patronising non-league football. I could see it in the faces of those fans on the pitch. Look at us. We’re re-enacting those funny little kids in parkas at Hereford. Isn’t it funny what they let you get away with at these little clubs with old men for stewards?

FCUM was formed with good, if not great intentions. But God they’re pleased with themselves aren’t they? Like AFC Wimbledon and Bardford Park Avenue, they are the self-appointed banner wavers for the When Saturday Comes generation. They are the fanzine-writers grown up with a mortgage.They are the antithesis of No-one Likes Us, We don’t Care. They believe that everybody loves them, and they very much do care.

But you know, there are people just like them at Rochdale. A proper club. A real club with a history and a body of support that decided from the beginning to reject the glory option that FCUM fans chose when they followed Cantona and his ilk. Rochdale fans are the real revolutionaries here. If only they could call on the attention and faux-support that their FCUM’s novelty commands.

There are other clubs too. Oldham, Altrincham, Manchester FC, Radcliffe Borough. How many FCUM fans come from these areas? If you want to watch football in Bury, then watch Bury FC. They’ve been offering affordable meat-pie entertainment for a hundred years.And they aren’t pretentious enough to call themselves Football Club of Bury.

I really don’t want to criticise those who founded the new club. Their heart is in the right place, and their community ethos is admirable. But as they get bigger they will face the same problems that face all small clubs when they achieve some success.  While their refusal to grant interviews in support of the NUJ strike was admirable, they have already betrayed their constitution by agreeing to a Friday night kick off. They sold their principles for ESPN money. Taking money from Americans. How crass. Some of their fans may now leave to form a breakaway club.

Fan ownership is an admirable ideal. One of the many good things to come from FCUM is that they have raised the profile of this business model, and have encouraged other fan groups to attempt coups at other clubs. But fan ownership isn’t really a new thing. You think the people who run my village club are in it for the money? There are thousands of clubs out there being run by fans if you look outside the professional game.

I think FCUM are a flash in the pan. What will happen if the Glazers sell Man United? They will return to their real club, just like I returned to Cardiff City when Hammam left. Their moment of television glory was hijacked by glory-hunting tourists from Old Trafford. The pitch-invaders danced smugly on the Spotlands pitch while the purists amongst their support booed them off.  Growth will kill them as they attract followers who are only in it for the freedom to play up that is provided by semi-pro football. At that point, the really committed might go and support their small local club, just like they should have done in the first place.