I wonder Who Will Read This Article

The power of the Internet has taken many of us oldies by surprise. In fact all I will do once I've finished this article is press the 'publish' button and millions around the world will have access to these words. The widget below will demonstrate where in the world those of you are reading this article.



The story...

A good mate of mine and I was having a beer in the local towards the end of last season and we got onto the subject of football forums. He knew I was the editor of Vital Manchester City and with him being an avid follower of Manchester United - well I'm sure you can imagine we've had a good debate or two over the years.

This particular chap is the restaurant / bar manager of a semi-professional football club here in our neck of the woods. I don't wish to embarrass this chap or the club concerned; however it won't take a detective to work out which team I'm talking about. All you have to do is take a look under my forum avatar to see the club who I may refer to.

This person (who will be referred to as Mr F) told me last season he received several complaints from disgruntled home supporters about the length of time they had to queue at half-time for refreshments at a particular important game. Apparently, even though this teams home attendance is approximately 1,300 there wasn't sufficient staff to meet the demand. On his drive home Mr F had a think about how to rectify the problem and low and behold and before his tyres reached his front door the Chairman from the club was on the mobile.

'I've been on our supporter's forum Mr F and the fans are screaming for blood. Why they say do they have to queue 15 minutes for food and drink? I want an answer now.'

Mr F put the cars handbrake on and quietly walked in to his house. His wife and two daughters were sat with the TV on eating their dinner when Mr F burst into a frenzy.

'Mr Chairman. I have heard about the catering complaints and I apologise to those concerned. Today we had a bigger crowd than anticipated which in turn took my staff and I by surprise. I know where the fault lay and it won't happen again.'

The Chairman replied...

'I won't accept this sort of thing. The supporters of this club come before you and I and this must never happen again or else your job will be on the line.'

Mr F was, as you can imagine 'ticking like a clock' and on the verge of handing in his resignation. In fact this Manure fan (he is a Rag but I can't bring myself to call him it) was gulping pints of Guinness like they were going out of fashion when I had a brainwave.

'Have you ever thought of registering on the fans forum and tell those who moaned why there was a 15 minute wait at the canteen.'

Nope was the reply.

We enveloped our discussion around the power of Internet forums and after a couple of hours we ended up drinking single malts and pissed.

The point of this article is...

* How many football chairman and officials read fans football forums?
* If they read them do they take any notice, similar to the above story?
* How much influence do fans forums actually have?

The article headline reads...

I wonder Who Will Read This Article

Over to you?

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