Soccer AM

I really feel for fans of Chester City. They've been shafted. And now they don't have a team. Or at least they have to start again. Portsmouth (whose fans also deserve sympathy) have gone into administration with debts of over £70million.

Chester have gone out of business because of a tax bill of just over £26k. Not an insignificant amount of money, but less than some players earn in a day. I don't blame a player for earning whatever they can get. I'd do the same. But something doesn't seem right.

I really hope my sympathy for Chester isn't in some way exacerbated by the fact that it puts Cambridge in a lot of trouble. We've beaten them twice. Six points.

Presuming their results are scratched, we lose those points, and by my reckoning, that puts us in, or very close to, the relegation zone - depending on how clubs around us have done against them.

It's a reality. Cambridge United could get relegated from the Conference. We are potentially just a few games away from being in the 6th tier of English football.

Much like James Purefoy and Yeovil a few weeks back, I still harbour the dream that the U's will one day get into the Premier League, and win a trophy. How, I don't know. When, not for ages. But it is still a dream some where at the back of my mind.

Dreams

There are other dreams, generally non-football related, closer to the front of my mind. But they tend to involve models, or Hollywood actresses, or Georgie or Millie, and I'm not allowed to talk about them.

I think we could go up the leagues from the Conference, but from Conference South? I'm not so sure. It's starting to sound a little ridiculous.

The Conference is about as good as League 2. Apart from Torquay, who've been rubbish this year, most teams who go up into the league tend to make a decent fist of it and challenge for the play-offs at least.

I have got used to being a Conference side, but a Conference side who are near the top of the league and who will end up in the play-offs. When the season starts, we're always one of the "teams to beat" selected by some random ex-pro, who always says we're "big and strong" - which is a bit like admitting you haven't seen Cambridge play since 1991.

Anyway, there's some (very very small) comfort, that despite being in the Conference, we're a big fish. Away teams get excited about a trip to the Abbey Stadium: a ground with a capacity edging towards 10,000 (although we could probably lease out 7,000 places to people who just want to get out of the rain).

Opposition teams will always "stick 10 men behind the ball" against us. A point is a good result at the Abbey.

Well perhaps I'm getting carried away. And trying to get some solace out of being in division 5, rather than being in the League, is a bit like trying to claim that living (as I do) in a third and fourth floor flat, is better than having a big house, with a big garden, because I don't have to look after it.

Bitter

I'm bitter. I want to be in the league again. I want my goals to be in the League 2 goal wrap. I want to be in the Johnstone's Paint Trophy.

And what I definitely don't want to be, is a bigger fish in a smaller pond. Football fans are all patronising. Any club smaller than them is basically insignificant. So when I look at Blue Square South, I just feel a bit rubbish at the thought of facing those teams.

It's important to add the phrase "with all due respect" before I lay into the teams in the BSQ South. But Bishop Stortford? Really? There's still a Wimpy in Bishop Stortford. I don't want to play there. St Albans? That's not a football team, that's where my friends Ian and Carly live, and where I used to go for Christmas with Paul and Sylvia (who, incidentally made very good biscuits).

I couldn't face that. I've been to see Cambridge play at Old Trafford, at Newcastle. I've seen them in the play-offs to get in the Premier League.

Of course my life will go on - and like I've got used to the Conference, I'll get used to the Conference South - but I'm not ready for it. Please don't let it happen. At least we still exist...

Have a good week,

Max