Pompey should copy the example set by Wrexham
As another football season draws towards a close and Pompey complete their sixth season in English football’s third tier, the overwhelming taste of mediocrity lingers on the taste buds.
It’s a familiar taste, like coffee in the morning or horse genitals if you live in an SO postcode.
However, familiarity breeds contempt, which also sounds like a horse. I am bored. There I said it, it’s boring. Not bestiality but following Pompey currently. I can hear the ‘at least we have a football club’ crowd getting all juiced up, while reaching for their Portsmouth Supporters Trusts share certificate.
I had one too, well a third of one at least. I also believe the Eisners have been a great tonic for the club. A steady hand, with shrewd infrastructure investment that has seen Fratton Park modernised and the clubs’ finances recover in line with its means.
But I’m still bored. I’m not bored because we will spend a seventh season in League One, a club doesn’t need to be in the Premier League or Championship to have fun. Just look at Wrexham. Wrexham is a fantastic example of what is achievable when you build from the community up.
The people of Wrexham are Wrexham AFC and visa-versa. Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney haven’t just invested their money, they have invested their energy and galvanised the community spirit, bringing it to fever pitch.
I love what they have done at Wrexham and believe Pompey is similar in many ways.
Obviously, we’re not Welsh and that is a massive advantage, but we are a proud city, with a rich footballing heritage. I’d like to see the Eisners light a fire under us again, re-ignite the passion which lays relatively dormant and put Pompey back on the map, irrespective of which league we are in. Throughout Pompey’s 125th anniversary celebrations we have seen greats of the past revisit Fratton Park. More than one was heard to say, ‘it was a lot louder in my day’.
That probably has more to do with a hearing impairment, but I think it's true to say there is something less tangible than the Fratton End roar missing. It's belief - belief in ourselves, belief in the football club and belief in the project. Our football style is the same as our leadership, reserved and strangely un-American.