I think, ideally, the Stockport county model would be my preference.
The year is 2038. They’re around tier 6, Vanarama North, with a promotion to the Vanarana National representing an incredibly successful groundbreaking season. Then sort of floating between the two. I would get a bit uncomfortable if they were on the verge of promotion back into the league, but then rejoice as they bottle a play off game and slip to another few relegations.
The ground is very important in this vision. I want them to keep it. I want 2,800 home fans watching them at that level, preferably with all 3 stands open so it looks even worse. They will be hamstrung by it, a noose around their neck. All money every year goes to paying for the ground, they can’t afford any paint or do maintenance on it so it falls into complete disrepair. Despite leaving 15 years in the past, C H A N S I R I still dominates the seats because they can’t afford to change it. A constant reminder. The image of the owl rimming a man’s arse is also still there.
They’ve finally arranged the move into the Dronfield stadium that Sheffield FC currently use, as they got a new stadium 12 years ago. It’s a perfect fit for Wednesday, in terms of club size and ground size. They operate at about 7/8 tier of English football and enjoy a fierce rivalry with Hallam and Sheffield FC. Rotherham, Barnsley and Chesterfield loan them under 18 players to ‘show them what men’s football is about’, but the players remain at their parent clubs to train as the facilities are much better. United buy up Hillsborough from them for a nominal fee, completely flatten the site, after the site has been fully decontaminated a purpose built training facility and 10,000 capacity mini ground for our under 23s and women’s team is incorporated, as well as tiered youth development pitches, similar to Barcelona or Man City. The site from which Mark Duffy struck his goal from is forever remembered with a statue on the exact spot. Their die hard lifelong fans don’t even have the solace of returning to Hillsborough to remember the good old days from 40 years ago when they were massive, as the site is fully red and white and an enormous Wembley-like arch of two huge swords looms over the site, along with the statue of Duffy as a constant reminder of what they had and who took it from them.
Every year we celebrate Bouncing Day as the poisoned blade which slowly killed them. The beginning of the end for them. Mark Duffy will go down as the first and only man to completely destroy an entire football club with a goal.
We will watch back at the Chansiri greeting video where they all bowed to him and tried to sing songs in his face with their tongue up his arse before he ruined their club.
We will gleefully watch the ‘WERE ON OUR WAAAAY WERE ON OUR WAY HOWDOWEGETHWEWWVIHFV KRSKJDCBK’ video from Wembley, and discuss what we think those people might be up to now, and how they spend their Saturday afternoons.
Most of all, we will remember how fucking annoying they were. How fucking thick they were. How deluded. Going back years, even since the early warnock years where we’d always beat them but they got bigger crowds so it didn’t matter, to us getting bigger crowds and crowds not mattering any more. To the 0-0 wins at our place. To the pre match build up to Bouncing Day where it was going to be the biggest derby day win of all time, before celebrating like they’d won the World Cup for getting a point 4 months later. To ‘what is a John fleck?’
We will have a day, probably in late September to mark this. A minute’s silence before the game nearest to Bouncing Day every year to make sure we NEVER forget how fucking annoying they were.
So no, I don’t hope they stay up this season mate.
