FOOTBALL FANS ANONYMOUS...BEATING THE ADDICTION OF THE MATCH

I have a confession to make. I have a problem, a major problem.  I, ladies and gentleman, am a drug addict. It’s taken me a while to recognise my problem, and has been rather hard to accept. It’s an addiction that started as a kid, began gathering significant momentum in 2003, really struck and became a definite addiction in 2005, and now, with my being 26 and having just finished a degree in Sports Development and Physical Education,  is something that needs dealing with before it has a potentially disastrous impact on my life. It is an addiction which I estimate has cost me in the region of £6500 over the last five years (which considering I am a poorly student who works part time is quite something), and has just caused me to slam the phone down on my mother, as I couldn’t take listening to her telling me why I should give it up. The fact that I’m now finished being a tax dodging “learner” is a very significant factor in the timing of my finally accepting I have a problem. I can no longer feed my addiction using that wonderful invention of the student loan. So many times over the last few years I have not had the means to feed my need, my want, my...precious, and so I went into debt to, and occasionally trouble with, a loan shark (otherwise known as a credit card). My thinking was ‘my student loan is due in a couple of months, I’ll pay it off then. Live for the moment- get that rush, that feeling you crave, you deserve it- you only missed two lectures this week...’ , and so I was satisfied, at least until the next  week.

It is now payment time for my next fix. However, prices have gone up again, as they have been consistently and drastically over my time as an addict. And I now do not have the safety net of the student loan to fall back on. I really don’t know how I’m going to finance it. And so a little voice has started in my head, asking whether enough is now enough, suggesting that maybe I should get a grip and stop letting it dominate my life. The little voice, and the not so little voice of my mother, argue that if I were to give up then I could do so much more in my life. The saved money could enable me to travel like I always wanted to, and the extra energy to furthering my future work prospects. But it’s not that easy, I’m finding it so hard to come to terms with the thought of letting go. No doubt you’re curious as to what drug it is I am addicted to (either that or you’re bored and about to turn off), and so here it is: I, Danny Norton, of Woolton Liverpool, am a football fan. A match-going fan. A season ticket holding fan. Ok, so maybe it’s not an actual drug per-say, but I am addicted.

I drink occasionally, I don’t smoke, and the closest thing to drugs I’ve taken are substances with obscene amounts of caffeine in on nights before an assignment was due. Football is my drug. But it’s an expensive drug, one which, as stated earlier, has cost me in the region of £6500 over the last five years through season tickets, cup games, away games and major finals in Cardiff, Istanbul and Athens.  And I’m not even the worse case. There a small number of my friends, both red and blue, who are even more addicted than I, who get every possible fix by going to literally EVERY game, from Spain to Ukraine, Milan to Brann.

Now, I know I could continue to go to the home cup games, and I might be able to get hold of the odd league ticket here and there, so it’s not like I’d be giving up my addiction completely, but the thought of having to give up my season ticket fills me with as much horror as the thought of Margaret Thatcher naked. Those who own a season ticket will back me up here. It’s a special thing to own a season ticket, you feel like a privileged person. Manchester United advertise theirs with the slogan ‘get that season ticket feeling’. And there indeed is a certain feeling attached to the season ticket. A feeling of pride, of place, and even a feeling of a kind of (non-existent) superiority over other fans. There exists in football fandom a social class, from the ‘football started in 1992 when it became fashionable’ lower class to the ‘I support my local team’ middle class, through to the ‘season-ticket holder’ upper class. This upper class is held in the highest of regards when the club is one where season tickets are like gold-dust. A club such as mine, where the waiting list for a season ticket is rumoured to be around 15 years. Therefore, giving up a season ticket is paramount to treason. High treason in a place like Liverpool. But with the cost of my beloved red, wooden, no.239 seat now a whooping £750, and no student loan to help pay for it and no high paying (or even just paying) graduate job as yet in the pipeline there may, gut wrenchingly, be no choice in the matter.

Now some may scoff at my statements, stating that going to a football match is not addictive and I should get a grip and stop being so overly dramatic, but others out there will know that it indeed can be addictive. Those people who spend their working week looking forward to going and letting it all out at three o’clock on a Saturday (or midday, or dinnertime, or 4pm on Sunday). Those people who are as calm as that time before the storm in every aspect of life but suddenly morph into Katrina as soon as they pass through the holy turnstiles. Those who are as sophisticated and intellectual as they come bar 90 minutes during which they more resemble a raging lunatic devoid of rationale thinking. They’ll all identify with my feelings (depending on whether or not they’ve realised that they too are also addicted). And I have a sneaky suspicion that there are a number of these people out there who are going through a similar ordeal to myself at the moment, having to consider the unthinkable- whether to give up the beloved holy chalice of the season ticket. My suspicions are given credence by the estimation that 1 in 7 fans will not renew their season ticket this season, due predominantly to the drastic rise in prices, with the average increase being 8%, more than double the rate of inflation.

You might notice me about this weekend anyway- I’ll be the one spontaneously jumping up shouting obscenities or bouncing up and down cheering and hugging anyone nearby. Classic season-ticket-withdrawal symptoms I hear...