Recently I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s all Nick Clegg’s fault. OK, not Doncaster Rovers propping up the League One table, nor the abject season of awfulness that’s caused it, but the weird atmosphere of division among supporters watching on.
Continue reading “Editorial: How do you solve a problem like the Rovers?”
Turns out a global pandemic has only intensified Jack Peat’s hatred for the EFL Trophy
I found my blood boiling once again last month when Rovers lined up against Wolverhampton Wanderers under-23s in the Papa John’s (yes the Papa fucking John’s!) Trophy on an ill-fated Tuesday night.
Continue reading “Papa John? Don’t Preach”
Don’t call it a comeback. To be fair, when I elected to take a break from popular STAND 17 months ago, I didn’t expect the world as we know it to grind to a halt. It would be particularly pretentious to suggest these two things are directly connected, but we miss one season in 22 years and suddenly the final League One standings are being calculated on the back of a fag packet and the FA can’t bring themselves to let fans back into football grounds. So yeah, let’s not call it a comeback. It’s much more of an intervention. Continue reading “Don’t call it a comeback”
With the prospect of several fan-free months becoming an increasing reality, thoughts have turned to how lower league clubs, the majority of whom are dependent on gate receipts for survival, will make it out of the current pandemic unscathed. Continue reading “How a radical rescue plan could put fans at the heart of a revival”
Twenty-one years ago popular STAND fanzine was established because Doncaster Rovers were teetering on the edge of existence, and our founding editor believed ‘the other fanzines that were around were being too easy on the club’s owners and its plight.’ In short, we were set up to speak up and to speak out against those who didn’t uphold what the game and what our clubs were about. Continue reading “Twenty isn’t plenty in football’s unending banterfication”
Gamble! There was a time that this was my footballing mantra. An instruction and means of approach to the game I not only encouraged of myself, but would do all I could to instil into those around me. But then this was nothing to do with ‘accas’ or spread bets. Instead this was an attempt to get the university football team I managed to take advantage of the unpredictable nature of BUSA Midlands Division 4C level defending. So, each week we gambled on the bounce of long throw-ins, but never on the minute of the first one. Continue reading “Against the odds: on gambling and football”
I’m not really sold on the book I‘m currently reading. It was recommended by a friend, so I’m giving it a fair go, but I’m 117 pages in and struggling to empathise with either the characters or the author. The main protagonist is from Yorkshire, but lives in London, yet any references to her life in Yorkshire are made as if written for a middle-class London audience. It’s cliched, dismissive to the point of patronisation, and I can’t get past it. Nor, given that the author is from and indeed lives in Yorkshire, can I begin to understand it. Continue reading “On visiting markets over cracking markets”
On Tuesday 29 August, Grimsby Town host Doncaster Rovers in the Checkatrade Trophy, but a large number of supporters won’t be there. Instead, they’ll be three miles down the road, on a pitch of their own, in opposition to each other, but also in opposition to the Football League. Continue reading “The fans kicking off against the EFL”
Up on the Wembley big screens, as England were preparing to face Malta, the pre-match audio-visual assault of corporate messages paused long enough to herald the introduction of Dab Cam. As fans took their seats a roaming lens flitted about the stadium and zoomed in on supporters and remained fixed on their gurning faces until they made a misguided and peer-pressured attempt at performing ‘the dab’. And so, another new in-stadium phenomenon was instantly born; the Mexican Cringe. Continue reading “Dab Cams and Dud Cups; on the FA’s Failing of Lower League Clubs”
I am unable to recall when or why I fell in love with football. There was no epiphany. No great moment of clarity. Football, as far as I can remember, was simply always there; eternally bobbling about alongside grazed knees and Why Don’t You? in the goalmouth scramble of my childhood. Continue reading “Editorial: On Contemplating Life Without Football”
popular STAND fanzine 