BRISTOL ROVERS BLOG: G is for Gas - Great Expectations
Posted: April 17, 2015
By Martin Bull
In Charles Dickens’ masterpiece the ‘Great Expectations’ were hopes and dreams of wealth, love, and becoming a gentleman, all washed down with the old Victorian dénouement of the eventual triumph of good over evil. For us Gasheads the original expectations for our life in the Conference Premier weren’t that great, and were surpassed a long time ago anyway.
So do we stick with the expectations that many fans had at the start of the season, such as a play-off spot with maybe a less than positive outcome, or do we really now push on and expect promotion, by whatever route we have to take?
I’ve never fully understood the idea that you have expectations in August that should then last you a full eight months and never change. The football squad changes during the long season, the manager and staff also often change, and the finances can ebb and flow as well depending on variables such as ownership, investment, transfers and cup matches. Why shouldn’t expectations also be liquid as well?
I’m not suggesting that a brace of good games should result in angry insurrection if a title isn’t later secured, but I do think that after sustained success on the pitch we should be allowed to have escalating aspirations and to be able to actually enjoy the wins for once. One loss in the last 27 league matches (or two losses in 37 league matches; take your pick of stats), unbeaten in 18 away matches, nine wins in the last 12 matches, and 21 clean sheets in 44 league games, are all staggering statistics which show that we shouldn’t be frightened of any team in a potential play-off.
We should all be plotting a path for promotion this season rather than harking back to our poor start, or our occasional slip ups to a couple of relatively local clubs famed for their rich owners rather than their Football League history. No team in their right minds would wish to face us at the moment, and we not only have a far stronger and improved squad than the one that started the season, but one that is playing with confidence, mutual understanding, and some considerable flair.
Does this, or our steadfast fan base, guarantee us promotion?
Of course not, but it gives us a great platform to have the confidence (not arrogance), that we can grasp the reward that being one of the top two teams in the league warrants. We aren’t Luton Town in 2010 and hopefully we won’t freeze like them either. We have learnt very fast how to adapt to life after the Football League, especially when faced with early defeats, and negativity. And one little known fact is that in their first four seasons in the Conference, Luton Town consistently failed in the league against the top five teams, a fragility which was re-iterated by three consecutive play-off losses.
Paul Buckle famously said that Gasheads needed to lower their expectations after the poor start to our first season back in the basement division in 2011, and to some degree he was right, but primarily only in regards to the impatience of our expectations rather than the actual League One vision itself. One day I will write a re-appraisal of the orange coloured one, but not quite yet. Rather like the life and times of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya or Mohamed Siad Barre in Somalia, the wounds are still a little too raw.
What matters to me is that our Great Expectations are firmed based on reality and our new approach. Just as exactly 75% of Conference Premier football clubs were founded in the Victorian era of benevolence, gentlemanly conduct, and hard work, it is important that our aspirations to improve are not driven by arrogance or snobbery, flashing cash at players coming for an easy ride, but through the timeless conviction of education, discipline, and respect.
For Dickens his novel was a ‘homecoming’ back to previous themes and territory after an anguished divorce; half comfort blanket, half rallying cry to buck ourselves up and get back to basics. A homecoming of our own would certainly be a fitting tribute to loyal Gasheads. Rather like Dickens’s protagonist, Pip, we, ‘the Rovers’, may often be outcasts, weighed down by our less than glorious past, but there is no reason why we cannot build on this excellent turnaround in moral fibre and achieve our own ‘walking off into the sunset’ moment.
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Martin Bull became a Gashead in 1989 and immediately fell in love with Twerton Park, standing near G pillar. In 2006 he wrote, photographed and published the first independent book about the artist Banksy. Having been exiled for much of his past, away games have always been special for him; so much so that he has just finished a new book about them -
www.awaythegas.org.ukRead more:
www.bristolpost.co.uk/BRISTOL-ROVERS-BLOG-G-Gas-Great-Expectations/story-26344782-detail/story.html#ixzz3XYsI9N2i
