Is football enjoyable? As a club owner it is surprisingly difficult to answer

Ten months into football club ownership and the question that comes up with most frequency is: “Are you enjoying it?” Normally this would be a straightforward question to answer and yet it struck me as surprisingly difficult until I had the time to think properly about it.

Football is both of and for our communities, holds up a mirror to our society and gives us a unique window into human behaviour and psychology. On occasion it offers a powerful metaphor for the things in life worth striving for and an opportunity to be part of what Jon Yates, in his book Fractured, calls the “common life”: moments of shared experience that are not dependent on class, education, race or any other variable but become the moments that allow us to see beyond the boundaries and prejudices that our politics are often reinforcing. Football has the ability to remind us of our collective power and the sense of community.

But when I am asked whether I am enjoying the experience of football ownership, the short answer is “no”, in part because of the lack of rationality in the game. It’s not enjoyable on a day-to-day basis but neither should it be. In the same way that some people have an obsession with “happiness” or “success” as a goal in life, consistent enjoyment is unattainable and undesirable as a permanent state. As Victor Frankl stated in his seminal work, Man’s Search For Meaning: “Don’t aim at success – the more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue.”

The last 10 months have been a massive opportunity to learn, to connect, to be challenged and to be part of a community’s story that is bigger than our own. The moments of joy are rare, but