FC: Kidderminster Harriers vs Torquay Utd, 1 Nov 2014

Thanks for the kind comments. Stefano is absolutely right about the range of fine contributors on this and other sites. He rightly names several; there are others. I'll also put in a word for the cracking match reports which are regularly presented. Great stuff.

Jon, of course, is chiefly known for his liking of Wetherspoon's Extra Large Mega-Mixed Grill. Especially when there's an additional "go large" option. Had he made it to Kidderminster yesterday he would have whisked Chelston and myself straight to the The Penny Black (one for the historians to work out). Chelston, I suspect, would have been more than happy with the Severn Valley Railway's catering. Suitable station buffet surroundings naturally.

The striking thing about football supporting is the fact it's based on regularity of attendance. Think about it and there's actually a rather staggering number of people who watch at least twenty matches a season at Plainmoor. Let's say 1800. Torquay United suffers because that's not as many as other comparable clubs. I still maintain it's remarkable. How many people visit a theatre twenty times a year? Or go horse racing that number of times? Or visit twenty National Trust properties in a year?

Football is lucky to have these people. It has to have them. Nor is it just a case of you or me going to around twenty games this season. It's based on us doing it year after year after year. Amazing.

We have to be stoical; we need to habitual; we must also tolerate each other (surely anyone fresh to football would see us a dour, sullen and serious-minded lot). Some of us are multi-sport enthusiasts. Others are set solely on football; it's a surprise how many of us have no interest in any other sport. Nor, when it comes to football, things that do not concern our club. I used to know a bloke called Nigel. You could not describe him as a sports enthusiast. Nor, really, a football fan. But he had a Huddersfield Town season ticket. That's "mono" something or the other.

And that's just "old" media. I still buy but have a tendency to "skim". I'm not one for match reports to be honest.

Nor have I resolved the Sunday Independent/Western Morning News issue. Well, not whilst the WMN is still dishing out the 50p vouchers. I've a supply until Christmas.

There's so much football media. I buy a daily paper for 30p. In theory that's giving me just the right amount of football news and comment. Yet I don't read it all. I'm sure Paul Scholes is very insightful but I never actually settle to read his words. I find myself flitting between content all over the place. I can compartmentalise if I so wish and, say, spend all my time reading about a single league or a single club. This means it's strangely easy to miss the big stuff. Indeed there are times when I reach Friday without remembering to watch the highlights of last Saturday's game.

I actually marvel at the information that the likes of JamesB take on board but worry that, one day, their heads will explode. Good grief, I hope that doesn't explain his non-appearance at Kidderminster.

I've known many people who've had a broad interest in sport: a bit of football here; cricket there; rugby, athletics, golf, tennis and boxing too. Mostly on television, of course, but live events from time to time. Often the majority interest was in football but that's largely because there's "a lot of it about" compared to other sports. And, totting it up, I've probably paid to watch ten different sports myself.

These people of my acquaintance "cherry picked" with their live attendance. "Big days out" a few times a year; mainly top-class stuff. They rarely had interest in any sport below the very top level. But most would have considered themselves decent sports players. One even told me he could "hold his own" playing for Torquay United. He was forty-nine at the time.

They've mainly been what you'd count as "professional types". Sport alongside other things in life. Never an obsession; no desire to get sucked into the regularity or commitment of it all. Nor a great wish, other than from afar or in name only, to suffer the trials and tribulations associated with regular defeats. They would not wish to "watch rubbish". Not like us poor sods. Nothing wrong with any of this. There will be people reading this with a healthy interest in all manner of sports.

Several of these friends, especially the ones I knew in Somerset, have attended games at Plainmoor. I always knew never to attempt to persuade them to attend on a regular basis. However much they enjoyed their visits, I realised they were simply not inclined to ever want to come to more than one game a season.

Football's marketing people may have seen them as potential regular customers. They would have proved stony ground. The Chiefs? A different matter I suspect. I'd be interested in Hector's view of the regularity of attendance at the Chiefs. I'm imagining a relatively small pool of season ticket holders by football standards; a vast quantity of "occasionals" that's enormous compared to football. I'll make a ludicrous stab at guessing that, if Chiefs' average attendance is four times that of Torquay United, they draw at least ten times as many different individuals through the gates during the course of the season. And they probably all go home happy.

This is an interesting angle when taken from the perspective of a long-standing football supporter who is accustomed, through support of their own team, to attending events twenty or more times a year. I reckon you could have an enjoyable time by cutting your visits to Plainmoor; watching a bit of rugby; taking in an annual match (of some description) in Bristol, Cardiff or Southampton; other sports too when they take your fancy. It doesn't have to absolutely top-notch either. It's all forgivable; none of it is a crime. It's not as if you're suddenly supporting Exeter City.

I effectively "gave up Plainmoor" when I moved to Sheffield for two years. I didn't move there to escape Plainmoor - that wasn't the reason at all - but I did factor my feelings about no longer being a Torquay United regular into my decision. More than one person clearly assumed I would carry on coming to all the home games!

The point was I had grown accustomed to a variety of football. I still enjoyed going to Plainmoor but tended to get more satisfaction from away matches and my "miscellaneous" games. These were different; the home games routine. I don't think this a purely Plainmoor issue per se; more something that happens to people who attend the same football ground year after year.

So, when push came to shove, I knew I could "walk" from Plainmoor. The trick was to continue watching football and try to be somewhere I wanted to be whilst home games were being played. The Leicester City League Cup match was the first game I missed at Plainmoor for ages. I'd been given a lift to Runcorn Linnets v Hemsworth Miners Welfare in the FA Cup. I hardly gave Torquay's game a thought. But I wasn't exactly "straying". I was going to Fleetwood on the Saturday.

But I knew things would change. I reasoned I would start to miss Plainmoor after a while and that "hopping" around non-league grounds would lose its' appeal after the first fifty or so. I also suspected that, however many Tuesday evenings I spent at Bramall Lane or Hillsborough, I was never going to really give a fig for United or Wednesday. Sooner or later I'd be wanting to be back at Plainmoor.

I reasoned two years; I could have stretched it to a third. I couldn't have done it living in Devon but a sabbatical is an idea which could work for some people.

Ah but I did miss two horrible home seasons. If those had been two promotion-winning seasons - with us now being in the Championship - I would have been absolutely bereft. Maybe that's what Sam means when he tells us to stick with it.

&I'd always give a plug for local football. Dave R was real enthusiast for the South Devon League and just above. For me it's "proper" if there's a rail around the pitch, a programme, a cuppa and an admission charge. When I was in Sheffield I watched a lot of what I'd call "senior non-league" (the top four tiers below the Football League). In Devon you don't get that option outside of Bideford or Tiverton. The odd thing is that the lower levels are often more attack-minded. Don't expect "quality" but it's normally entertaining, eventful and...um...competitive. At £3-4 you can't go wrong with the Peninsula League. But you wouldn't want it as your main football.

And, yes, Stefano has drawn our attention to Ivybridge Town being top, top, top of the league. It always helps to grab the points off Bodmin. Elsewhere, reading this week's Express and Echo, you get the impression Kevin Hill may be tempted by the manger's job at Exmouth Town.

My feeling, Barton, is that the attendees are more interchangeable at Sandy Park for the rugby than the football but that majority of the crowd are regulars. I wouldn't know what percentage are season-ticket holders (although you see plenty waved at the bar) but the amount of people in Chiefs colours, scarves etc, suggest people who go are pretty passionate about the team and they have a decent away following - not that I have followed them away yet. My attendance is more sporadic, as I tend only to go to Chiefs when Torquay are away, although I think I have chosen to go to Chiefs when it clashed with a cup game at Plainmoor that my Torquay season ticket didn't cover. It may have been the Rochdale match last year, I don't remember but I think that is the only time I put Chiefs first. Last season I probably went to around 12 games at Sandy Park, similar the year before. This season I have only been twice so far - the first few were on TV and wanted to save money. So there are probably plenty like me, who tend to 'pick and choose' a bit more. The difference though between Chiefs and TUFC, is I always enjoy it, even if the result is not a good one. Perhaps it is because I care, just that little bit less, but also because watching the Chiefs you know that there will be dips on what is essentially an upward trajectory. But I felt the same when I watched them in the Championship and now the Premiership. watching Torquay just feels so hopeless and that is what I am finding myself doing more and more - almost disengaging myself, so that the all too frequent disappointments don't hurt anymore.

That's fair. We had a chance towards the end because Kiddy overlooked scoring a third goal.

If it had been four we couldn't have complained.

The code breaking team are still working on this:

"The last twenty minutes has given me the belief that my team are returning".

Where have they been?

10pm and still no positive thoughts in mind.

I need the Devon St Luke's to snap out of it.

Excellent. I hope you're ticking them in your members' handbook.

not this one mate