Why I’m A Hopper
Everyone remembers the first time they walked up the steps into their first-ever football stadium.
Most likely, it would be with friends or a parent. It could have been a big Premier League stadium, or it could have been your local non-league team, but you remember it…
The noise, the smells, the feelings of belonging among this crowd of people you’ve never met before.
British football’s league tier system has remained largely unchanged since it was first introduced in 1888.
Of course, it has expanded and incorporated more clubs since then and football became the number one sport for generations of spectators and athletes alike.
When the so-called ‘Big Six’ made the crazy decision to break away from the Premier League and join a European Super League, they effectively attempted to turn their backs on people like myself and let greed and money dictate their futures.
Luckily, their fanbases outrage and the general backlash from the public made them promptly change their minds and renege on the deal they had already struck with European partners. The bad taste it left, however, remains.
All of this has made me want to visit clubs where money is much more needed than in the upper echelons of English football and the odyssey begins with Hartlepool United.
I have visited many grounds in the past but my Hopper Tales will begin from scratch and I will be sharing them here, as I go.
