Woke up this morning and felt a need to write something as a life long Manchester City fan. So much negativity around the club that I love and have watched since 1968.
It has been said in the media world that the truth should never get in the way of a good story. Over the course of my life, 60 years this far, I have seen this to be self evident in many many situations, both sporting and non.
Their job is to sell newspapers, get clicks and stir the pot. It has always been so. It may feel different in this scenario because they are going after our beloved Manchester City but we have been here before and won. .
We know what it feels like to be fucked.To feel like it has all gone tits up.
Halifax in the Cup.
Luton and David Pleat.
Ricky Villa.
Years and years of spankings by the different red shirts. Knowing we were shit and still showing up. We were there, somewhere, having our own experience of being City.
We know what it feels like.
Unlike all of our antagonists, who have dined for a long time at the top table. Who gorged themselves on a cycle of unfettered success. Unchallenged because of the hegemony they created.
They became complacent and stuffed full of themselves and their self important shite. Corrupt and bloated to the core.
They do not know how it feels to lose.
So when we kicked the door down, because it was the only way in, and brought a level of competition they could not live with,they did not have the spine for the fight. None of them. They tried to meet us on the pitch and failed. They tried through UEFA to knock us out and they failed again. So now they resort to the only weapon they have left. Old money. Old power. Friends in high places. The real corruption. Hidden in plain sight.
But they have picked a fight with a club who know how to scrap.We know the pain of losing big and we know how to come back from that.
Dropping 2 divisions.
Dark days and grim gallows humour.That place somewhere in the old ridings where 300,000 of us watched on in the shadows
Then Gillingham. A moment when the future looked so bleak that people walked away from Wembley , muttering "fucking typical City," only to be drawn back by a miracle.
Imagine that we had lost. I did. And I knew we would still be here come the next season.
QPR. Dead and buried. To make matters worse the old enemy winning it all. Again. Not in my lifetime. You think? Another miracle. A big fuck off metaphorical wink from Mario.
Champions.
Only this.
Just the beginning.
This club, players, management and of course us, the supporters, do not ever lie down.This too I have witnessed. Time and time again. We are City.
It is not even about the winning for me. When you have lost so many times you understand the balance of all things more deeply. You know you can always lose and it makes the joy of winning something our red friends will never ever get to experience.
The day Sergio scored was the loudest noise I ever heard in a football ground and I knew why. That banner. That sanctimonious, rub it in our faces spineless bunch of toss perpetrated by the prawn sandwich brigade. The old money. They never saw it coming. Noisy neighbours indeed.
I understood completely and more than ever before what it meant to be a Manchester City fan.
We can lose this current fight and we will still be here. That's what makes us a fucker to fight with. We don't know when we are beaten.
We're Man City.
We'll fight to the end.
flintbishop.co.uk