Misery needs company

Did social media kill football fandom or revive something that was always there?

I can't pinpoint the exact moment that I noticed it, but I do know that it started sometime after Bromley got to Wembley in 2018.

When Neil Smith’s side took the fans on a dream run to the FA Trophy final, expectations changed and emotions became highly charged. 

The following season (2018/19), there was a palpable sense that some fans expected Bromley to mount a serious promotion charge. Maybe that was to be expected as Bromley had finished the previous two seasons 10th and 9th respectively.

A promotion charge didn’t materialise. The goals of Luke Wanadio, Josh Rees, and Louis Dennis weren’t replaced and Bromley followed the Wembley season with a disappointing 12th-place finish. 

In truth, from that point on, Neil Smith was always on borrowed time. His clock ticked slower during Bromley’s record-breaking run at the start of the 2019/20 season. The Ravens topped the table at the end of September and were firmly ensconced in the top four at the turn of the year. But a run of no wins in nine before COVID cancelled the season saw many openly calling for Smith to go.

Consequently, it was no surprise that those calls reached fever pitch when Bromley’s 2020/21 season suffered some ups and downs. On the day Neil was removed from his post, Bromley had just lost to the runaway league leaders, and long-standing rivals, Sutton United. However, they had taken 24 points from the previous 39 available and were 7th in the league.

If that sounds bizarre, you’re not alone in thinking so. But this is the new era of fandom. The ducking stool shows its face more often these days. 

None of this is to say that fans don’t have a right to express their concern or shouldn’t express dissatisfaction. But that season was notable for the outrage that erupted every time Bromley didn’t win a game. 

Some would say it was due to the style of football being played. But since when has any fan cared how good the football is when the results are good?

Others would retort that Bromley weren’t getting results often enough, and rightly so. But Bromley were 7th at the time of Smudge’s sacking, albeit having played more games than their rivals. So the obvious question is, what does the average Bromley fan now expect? What is their barometer for success?

Promotion? Trophies? Winning constantly? Winning football? Football that’s pleasing on the eye?

The question is pertinent because, despite Smudge leaving and Bromley ending the season in a history-making playoff place under Andy Woodman, the same furious mentality has continued unabated. In Woodman’s case, it is even more bizarre than the opprobrium his predecessor suffered.

You would be correct to point out that last season’s 10th place finish was disappointing in the context of where Bromley were at the turn of the year. However, there can be no question that, as consolations go, winning the FA Trophy for the first time in front of over 40,000 at Wembley, against Wrexham, was more than adequate. 

That Trophy win will have done much more for the club than finishing 7th and losing in the first eliminator. Yet, for some fans, Woodman’s achievements are seemingly irrelevant. No fewer than two games into this season, there was already enough doom and gloom around to suggest that Woodman was a serial failure who hadn’t achieved anything for the club, let alone two back-to-back successes.

His crime? Not winning either of this season’s first two games and allowing last season’s league campaign to peter out.

Again, it begs the question: are the modern-day expectations of Bromley fans too high, or is this issue bigger than Bromley Football Club?

Has the 24/7 news cycle, TalkSport phone-in, social media hot take, and faux fan outrage culture taken over the non-league scene as well?

What drives a fan to meltdown every time their club fails to pick up three points or doesn’t do things the way they feel they should be done?

Have we moved past the stage where fans realistically assess their club’s aims for the season and actually wait for the season to play out?

Modern fan culture seems to extrapolate the whole season into one game, then vacillate according to the weekly results. I used to think this was an age thing and that I was now out of touch with the game, but I now see the hyperbole spreading across the age demographic. 

Then I wondered if it was down to whether you’d seen your club be crap before. If you had, surely all subsequent ‘failure’ could be placed in relative context? Yet I see people who’ve watched Bromley plumb the beleaguered depths of non-league contort with rage at a 3-2 defeat to Wealdstone in the National League.

I don’t have the answer. I'm just seeking to understand why this phenomenon has developed and from whence it came.

Does misery just need company? And is your football club the medium by which to achieve that?

Lets take this debate to the comments below

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