I'd managed to keep it together since the announcement, but that video probably impacted me more than anything from the past week. Football is all about emotions.
Yeah me too.
One of the ladies on there talked about her Father being born in 1928 and that’s one that resonates with a lot of us. This club isn’t just about what it is now and the fanbase is not just about those of us who are here now, for many of us it’s about the generations of Blues that have gone before us and how the club is part of the culture of our families and the culture of this city.
My Grandad was born in 1906 and first went to Hyde Road. He saw players spanning from Billy Meredith to Eric Brook, Tommy Johnson, Max Woosnam, Frank Swift, Peter Doherty, Ernie Toseland, Alec Herd, Fred Tilson, Bert Trautman, Joe Hayes, Bobby Johnstone… he had my Father when he was in his 50s and started taking him when we had Bell, Lee, Summerbee, Young, Oakes, Doyle…
On the other side of my family, they were all from Moss Side (Cheetham Hill originally for my Grandad on my Mother’s side, but he moved to Moss Side, which was seen as a move to a nice area compared to Cheetham Hill at the time). And they had Maine Road round the corner, City was part of their neighbourhood and part of their family routine.
My Dad’s Dad died in the 1970s, before I was born, and both my Mother’s parents are also now dead, but it’s because of them that I’m a Blue, with attendance of City games spanning over a century in our family.
So many of us have had family attendance at City through the decades, we’ve had family there to see, or we’ve seen ourselves, all the good times, all the bad times… I don’t believe in afterlife or the notion of our parents and grandparents being able see over us and what City are now. But their support of City lives on with us. And in the last decade with Pep and the success and also the beautiful football we’ve played under him, it is a deserving culmination of family history for so many of us.