Over the course of the past few years I’ve felt my desire to watch #htafc erode.
Support is personal, within a shared experience. Although you’re caught in a collective outpouring of emotion, how you feel remains unique.
My connection feels a million miles from here.

You want to feel as if a team you support can achieve anything. Not that you expect them to but you have to hope they can. Otherwise what’s the point?
You need players you can connect with and at Wembley that day there was a team I’ll never forget. Players where I felt invested

Combine that with a manager who you really like. One who has unbelievable charisma and gives the squad incredible belief.
Suddenly you’re not content to draw games, you are going out and taking it to big clubs. Victories against those teams you always lose to.

Going into every game thinking anything can happen and legendary moments occurring seemingly every week.
The ground louder than you’ve ever known it. Faces you’ve never seen before walking through the town radiating positivity.
You’re not also rans, you’re contenders.

Having a squad of continental stars, a German manager and suddenly a rather provincial club feel ready to branch out and take on the world.
Every signing was exciting, the players the best to have worn the shirt and nothing was surprising anymore. It was thrilling.

And then it’s done. As quickly as it came, it goes.
Suddenly you’re thrust back into everything you’ve ever known. The same trudge it often was. The special moments become increasingly rare and unlikely.
The players and the management return to being names on a team sheet.

Belief gone, connection increasingly frayed and suddenly everything you can do with your Saturdays looks more appealing.
Perhaps it’s heartbreak. Perhaps it’s pining for what once was and all that’s been lost.
At least there’ll always be the memories.