Falling and Laughing

Ron Waller

Let’s not muck about – it’s time for the post match Q&A to come to an end. For those that witnessed the painful display of Alan Parry attempting to drag out the session after the Rotherham home game, it’s a no-brainer. Presumably the idea originally was to try and bring fans and players closer together at the end of a game. Instead it succeeds only in driving them apart.

The Post-match Q&A achieves only one thing, and that’s the act of reducing Wycombe’s supporters to nothing but a hindrance to the players. A sour collective of moaning, downbeat types that for some unknown reason need to be fed a banquet of cliché and catchphrases until they finally, ultimately, eventually decide to get the fuck out of the Vere Suite.

It’s become obvious now. Most supporters aren’t like this. Most people have gone home. Long gone, with much better things to do – like drinking, eating, socialising, sitting in traffic or doing a jigsaw. The players work hard for a result, have a shower and then their hearts must sink at the thought of having to answer questions that no-one really wants to ask. Questions about other players’ injuries, other players’ contracts, the new ground, the transfer targets – none of which can be answered by the players. So they politely mumble their way through a stock answer, silently praying that no further questions will be asked. Any queries of the players’ performance themselves come across as either embarrassingly fawning, or plain rude and inappropriate. Who have you ever played for eh? As someone once griped. If we have lost, what player wants to get changed and then be berated by the fans up close? Are we not all just as disappointed and want to get home? What are achieving apart from some kind of executive stress ball for bitter characters?

Worse still, it seems no-one is listening anyway. At the post Rotherham Q&A the televisions were on, Manchester United v Arsenal played, club staff chatted and giggled loudly at the back of the room. Scott McGleish reminded me of years gone by, when you were forced to listen to elderly relatives blather on, when you knew Big Match Live was on, and you could be watching it rather than putting up with this tiresome drivel forced upon you by your Mum. McGleish wanted to watch the Arsenal game, we all did, but oh no, we have to pay lip service to some bizarre ritual of “fans having their say”, even when they had nothing to say.

Enough is enough. End this insipid exhibition of gloomy whining. It’s too late for all this. It’s March. There is nothing to gain by criticising players, tactics or formations at Q&A sessions in the Vere Suite, even if you are just waiting for the traffic to die down. We all want promotion - players, fans and staff – it’s two months of your life, supporting the club. It’s not that much.

You’re either in this or you’re not. We go to Lincoln. We go as one. See you there.

26.02.2008. 18:13

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