Tonight, I am beyond sadness.
Nobody died, but a little part of me did.
It will be of little or no interest to anyone and I say that without any form of self-pity – honest! – but a little part of my dream faded about an hour ago.
Since I was very young, all I wanted to do was write. I did not and do not pretend to be any good at it. I write by sense, by feel, without having any real idea what verbs and adjectives mean and do. I am like the musician who makes music but can’t read music. It’s not something I should brag about, for sure, but it sums up my lifetime’s struggle of trying to make sense of everything. For me, all of my schoolwork was a problem, from physics to maths, from geography to woodwork. All I could do to a decent level was write and that was what I most wanted to do.
In secondary school, I had an English teacher called Mrs Defonseca. She was Portuguese and – surprise! surprise! – spoke with a strong Portuguese accent, but even though English was obviously her second language, she inspired me to use and love words. By age 14, I knew what I wanted to do in life and for a living. I would write for life but the for-a-living-bit never happened. I probably didn’t work hard enough, try hard enough, know what to do enough. Maybe, just maybe, I wasn’t good enough. I am old and wise enough to understand, again without self pity, that the latter is probably the truth.
In my latter years of school, we had special evenings where employers would visit, to help us decide what we wanted to do with our lives. None of them interested me, with my complete lack of ability in all practical subjects and my complete lack of interest in the others. Actually, I had no interest in the practical subjects either! But there was one person there, a journalist from the Bristol Evening Post. Shamefully, I cannot remember her name but again, I loved what she did, the words that she wrote. I wanted to write words like that too.
I drifted into work and the decades went by with me sometimes writing, usually poems or song lyrics, all of which remain in the loft and then in 2001, I was offered the chance to write for the Bristol Rovers matchday programme, ‘The Pirate’. My first column appeared on 2 May 2001 when Rovers played Wycombe Wanderers and were relegated to League Two. Some lucky omen. It wasn’t a great article but the editor, Keith Brookman, saw enough in it to ask me to write some more. There was even a fee for writing: a matchday ticket!
Bristol Rovers was my club from around 1972. I watched them at Eastville, Twerton Park and now back in Bristol at the Memorial Stadium.
Whilst the football was often poor, I gained many friendships from supporting the club, many of which have endured to this day. Put simply: that club, now in non league football, thanks to the inept governance and lack of leadership from a group of bungling local businessmen, is supported by some of the best people I know.
Through the years of struggle, it still felt it was my club. I got more and more involved in providing direct support, channelling all my energies into helping them survive, raising money, trying to make it better.
And then, in 2006, the boardroom split and inevitably people took sides. Without going over it all again, one group of people wanted the club to have a long term, ambitious and sustainable plan to take the club forward, another group didn’t even want to talk about it. With the club now in its lowest position in its history, we know who won but more than that we know who lost.
By a supreme irony, in the summer of 2006, I was taken on by the Bristol Evening Post, along with my mate Sladey, as columnists, giving a Bristol Rovers point of view. At the time of untold misery on and off the field, I suddenly had a light at the end of the tunnel. Someone had recognised my writing, early reports on my efforts were favourable. Perhaps something could come of this?
But by the autumn, my writing life had been turned on its head. The club had forced me off the programme and, more disturbingly, the Bristol Evening Post removed us from our columns. The club chairman did not have the courage to sack me himself – he left that to someone else – and the editor of the Bristol Evening Post sent an underling to tell me that I was sacked from my unpaid job. I asked whose decision it was. He couldn’t tell me that. Well, it must have been the editor’s decision, mustn’t it? Was it the editor’s decision alone? He couldn’t tell me that either. Was anyone from the club involved in our removal from our newspaper column? Could you just tell me that? That was not for him to say. All he could do was tell me we had been fired. Former Post journalist Dennis Payter, a lifelong Rovers supporter, would replace us with immediate effect. Thanks for the coffee.
It took many years to find out what really happened, how it all came about, why the decision had nothing to do with the copy we were submitting. In fact, I only found out for sure this year from the most unlikely and unexpected sources. I should name names, I suppose, but we live in 21st century Britain, where only the very rich can use the law to suppress others. I would probably be sued for every penny I don’t have if I told what I knew, and know, to be true. Money is power, more than ever.
A couple of years later, after meeting the club’s former chairman Geoff Dunford I was restored to ‘The Pirate’. The club was still failing and falling, there were still angry debates on the internet forums, but the forces of conservatism at Bristol Rovers had greater control than ever. Nick Higgs, the new chairman, effectively owned the club a few years later. Well, that’s not true: he ineffectively owned it.
I still went to some games and my writing remained at a decent level but my heart wasn’t in the football anymore. I remained close to those who lost the Rovers war in 2006 and particularly close to one former director Kevin Spencer who has become a trusted, loyal friend.
In October 2012, I went to see Rovers play Torquay in a League Two game with a couple of old friends, James and Mark. The game was pretty nondescript, I think Rovers eventually won, but at half time, Kevin came over to talk to us. He had been banned from attending future games because of his “consistent criticism” of the club. It turned out that this banning order applied to funeral wakes too as Kevin was not allowed to attend the wake of much loved kit man Roger Harding who sadly passed away after a long and courageous fight with cancer. However, with wonderful consistency, he was allowed to attend rugby matches. Go figure.
I never felt quite the same about the people who ran Bristol Rovers, the ruling elite who put their personal interests above those of the club in 2006. And the new chairman, Nick Higgs, was even worse, showing a threadbare understanding of football, appointing a succession of managers and then sacking them and then taking the club – I hesitate to use the word leading, because he has never done that – into the Conference. Just think about it: those who ‘won’ the battle of 2006 succeeded in taking the club to the lowest point in its history. I am not saying those who ‘lost’ with their intentions to improve the club would have made a better fist of things – we shall never know – but my bet is that they would have.
My patience has worn so thin that I can no longer associate myself with those who own the club. I have written to four directors about Kevin’s banning order – Nick Higgs, Geoff Dunford, Chris Jelf and Brian Seymour Smith, the laughably named ‘fans director’ – and only one has bothered to reply: Mr Seymour Smith who said in his email, “It’s a matter for Nick.” Not bad for a bloke who only got on the board because the supporters paid a million quid – a million quid – to put him there. Thanks for that, Brian.
The final straw for me was Geoff Twentyman’s Radio Bristol interview with Nick Higgs in late summer. Geoff cornered Higgs on the question of Kevin’s banning order and the chairman’s reply – and don’t forget I don’t have access to the best lawyers in the land, so I can’t say what was ‘controversial’ about it (why take a chance?) – presented me with my decree nisi following my relationship of over 40 years with Bristol Rovers. I don’t know if Nick Higgs was there at Eastville in our darkest hours, or at Twerton when we were on our knees, and I certainly don’t remember seeing him around when things can beyond bad in 2002. But I know I was. I was in full time work, in a stressful job, earning buttons but I still found time to help the club I loved.
That I have written my last programme article for Bristol Rovers is hardly earth-shattering. The world will keep on turning, it won’t stop Rovers going to Alfreton tomorrow night, it won’t mean the board will end up resigning. Next to no one will give a toss and why should they? Bloke stops writing for programme. It’s not exactly ‘read all about it’, is it?
It really does break my heart to leave my beloved ‘Pirate’ but what can I do? I haven’t been to a game in two years, one of my closest friends remains banned without ever being told why (isn’t that right, Mr Higgs? You know it isn’t, really) and my decree absolute is in the post, or maybe in cyberspace.
I’d like to wish Mr Higgs well for the future. I’d like to, but I don’t. I certainly wish Bristol Rovers well, especially the supporters who stand for all the good bits. Mr Higgs said at a recent Q&A with supporters that “without the board there would be no Bristol Rovers.” Well, without the supporters, not least those who put a million quid in via the Supporters Club shareholding scheme, there certainly wouldn’t be.
It wasn’t the supporters who took the club into the Conference. It wasn’t the directors who resigned in 2006 because they believed the club could be better run and it certainly wasn’t me.
I always believed in better, still do. Supporters usually end up with the club they deserve. It’s hard to believe Gasheads deserve the current shambles. If they’re happy being in a play off position in the Conference, then great. I don’t think they are happy, but it’s time someone told the top of the shop, but don’t wait up for a reply.
4 comments
excellent summary – have faith – good overcomes evil -eventually?
I think you write well, and I enjoyed (if that’s the right word…) reading your story.
Unrequited love.
another cracking read and spot on.. when will Higgs & co wake up and smell the coffee? Sadly the likelihood is that it will far too late if they ever do!
Not sure how I stumbled across this article Rick but I’m glad I did. So many of us share the same vision of what Rovers could be if only the club had real leadership.
But we are not welcome because we frighten them.
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