| A message to the more positive supporter 12:22 - Aug 13 with 2701 views | Whos_blue |
I'm not sure how this will land, but here goes. (The thread is of course open to all, but I'm looking for kindred spirits first and foremost).
I might be classed as a happy clapper and to be honest that's probably fair.
I try to use football as an escape and dare I say enjoyable break from the old routine.
Like most people, I didn't find much enjoyment last season.
However, I can see how far the club has come since the dark days of Evans, Hurst and Lambert. From a run down midtable nothing of a club, what we've seen since Gamechanger come in is nothing short of miraculous.
I get that passions run high after a loss or poor result, but what we've seen over the last the last five days has actually been quite upsetting. Everyone is entitled to an opinion but jeez, it's been a bit of a cess pit here lately.
My question is what do I do?
Do I just avoid this place after a poor result or try to offer a balanced opinion? I got involved last night and regret it now. Not that I'm so precious about downvotes, I use them myself, but to be challenged and down voted for offering an opinion that Humphreys and Barbrook had done ok was just disheartening.
But then I also believe that to say nothing is to be complicit.
What approach do other more patient and long termist supporters do, because more nights like last night on here will just force people away and it risks becoming a haven for vitreol. |  |
| Distortion becomes somehow pure in its wildness. |
| |  |
| Nah, not good enough with his feet. (n/t) on 13:09 - Aug 13 with 577 views | Stadiumofdark |
| Nah, not good enough with his feet. (n/t) on 12:57 - Aug 13 by Bloots |
|
Ali doesnt feel he can contribute... |  | | |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 13:11 - Aug 13 with 581 views | Vic |
I feel your pain and felt exactly the same last night, and logged off shortly after FT. Everyone is entitled to an opinion, but the vitriol was something else - worse even than during the banter days. At least then there was a bit of gallows humour, last night it was just painful. So I logged on this morning with real trepidation and was glad to things had settled down a bit.
The problem is that these opening two games have seen us play very poorly - a continuation of the end of last season. The team in incoherent, the players don;t seem to be enjoying it and poor old AAH - it was just a mare for him. I actually felt for him and will be surprised if we see him again. Not sure how anyone recovers from that! Bottom line is that a team like ours, even with so many injuries and absentees, should still be beating a team like Bromley, who themselves weren't even at full strength. All this has resulted in some dooming us - which frustrates those who take a more optimistic view.
But truth is that none of us know what will happen. Personally I happy to settle at the moment for seeing the many extenuating factors - players leaving, not being able to make the signings we wanted (rather than lack of effort or concern that some seem to imply), and a hang over from last season with a lack of confidence.
As I see it things have started badly and McKenna has got a lot of work to do in many ways. But I think he's capable of it and with the players we've got to come into the side, and others we will sign I'm confident that we'll be OK and up there challenging when it counts most.
But it is a shame when the critics and doom mongers are so loud and simply rubbish an alternative, most positive outlook. Sometimes I just have to log off for a week or so! |  |
| |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 13:12 - Aug 13 with 578 views | PrideOfTheEast |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 12:29 - Aug 13 by mrfixit426 |
If it wasn't so tragic, it would be hilarious.
Win every pre-season game at a canter.
Get a valuable point at from potentially the toughest away game of the season in a hostile atmosphere at an absolute circus of an event orchestrated by Sky TV.
Lose in an early round of the League Cup to lower league opposition, just like we have for the previous (insert number here) seasons, in a game we seem to have used as an extra pre-season friendly.
Suddenly everyone is losing their minds. Mental. |
Agreed. But there is, and has been for some time, sensible criticism on here and elsewhere. The fact (eg) Ali is still anywhere near our 11 is down to poor transfer windows and I do think people have a point when expressing concern over the approach to the last 3 windows in particular.
Last Summer was at best chaotic. January didn’t address our fundamental issues particularly well, and this Summer to date has been similar to January with probably 5 key (and significant) signings needed in the next few weeks. I hope they’ve got players lined up, but fear they’ve again focused on entirely unrealistic targets, losing out on others along the way. That last point is potentially (and hopefully) completely unfounded but make no mistake this next few weeks define whether we’re in the top 2 or not, and our current squad, without Omari and Broadhead, doesn’t look like it is to me. |  | | |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 13:31 - Aug 13 with 511 views | stonojnr |
You know what I enjoyed the Premier League fwiw, not losing games so much but actually just being there being involved, occasionally seeing top footballers at their best, people youd only ever seen on TV.
And simply because for the past 20+ years its something I never thought id see in my lifetime again. I might never see it happen again now. Learn to appreciate special moments because you never know when you'll get them again
That's the perspective people need to have, and not treat it all as a disaster every game we dont crush another team.
My only advice would be dont worry about what others think, you know your own views, they seem perfectly realistic, you dont have to apologise for them | | | |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 13:31 - Aug 13 with 512 views | SuffolkPunchFC |
I'm with you too. Disappointing start to the season performance-wise, but nothing disastrous for our season yet - and certainly not anything akin to some of the tragedies taking place around the world right now. You can certainly assign the 'first world problems' tag to our slight stutter at the start of the season.
Roll on Sunday, and an opportunity to get our season underway. And even if we don't, I have much more serious things in my life to get depressed and/or angry about.
Don't take the negative comments and downvotes to heart. Many of these will come from the eternally negative posters on the forum - and you might even note a correlation between the posters who are constantly critical of some of our players, calling for them to 'respect the club' and yet show complete lack of respect for those same and other players. The irony is lost on most of course ... | | | |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 13:32 - Aug 13 with 512 views | SlimTeaBoy |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 12:43 - Aug 13 by blueasfook |
Indeed I find those who are blindly optimistic just as annoying as the negative ninnies. Our situation isnt great right now. We just lost a cup tie to a 4th division reserve side. A fortunate penalty saved our bacon against Brum, We are still needing 3 or 4 quality signings this window and we have at least one sulking primadonna who is refusing to play for us.
Can fully understand some fans being concerned. |
I could not agree more | | | |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 13:43 - Aug 13 with 481 views | MVBlue |
I am not a season ticket holder, so its easier for me to see the bigger picture of the journey we are on. And thats a journey of rebuilding to a top squad with quality throughout plus a manager who is learning what it takes to beat the best teams in the world and the land. If I was going each week and seeing the painful events and issues with getting along the journey I would be more susceptible to criticising the team and indeed may have thought swapping McKenna for Cooper was a good idea at Christmas (Lol). But I can see we are on a journey, and improving bit by bit but not at the rocket speed some people demand. We are trying to do the journey in the Ipswich way, retaining our identity.
Last night was painful, so many times over the years except for the glory season of 23/24 we failed in the league cup, and even in that season there was Maidstone. Last year we had a decent FA cup run, albeit with Delap and Omari featuring.
McKenna knows its not there yet, he needs more additions. He also needs to drop a couple of players that are not helping the journey. But we should see that we can be top 3
in October and the journey is on course then. |  |
| |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 13:45 - Aug 13 with 468 views | Chris_ITFC |
Brilliant thread. Some get far too high and far too low, and lose all perspective.
Unfortunately, those are often the ones who can’t help voice their views the loudest. |  |
| |
Login to get fewer ads
| If we end up with…. on 14:07 - Aug 13 with 390 views | Alberto_the_frog |
| If we end up with…. on 12:57 - Aug 13 by positivity |
cARnt bee wOrse than palmer/muric (insert current escaped goat here) |
Build a pen on the practice pitch to hold any escaped domestic animals. |  | | |
| If we end up with…. on 14:50 - Aug 13 with 349 views | BasingstokeBlue |
| If we end up with…. on 12:55 - Aug 13 by blueasfook |
I heard McK is gonna try him in goal |
I heard he still doesn't know where the goal is. |  |
| |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 14:54 - Aug 13 with 340 views | Churchman |
Thank you for posting this.
The only bit I disagree with is ‘to say nothing is to be complicit’. It isn’t. It’s letting the haters and quite frankly the sad and empty ITK delusional people vent to their hearts content. If TWTD, X or a loud hailer is their thing to spew, so be it. It is a view and like a’holes everyone has one. No need for balance because the perpetrators don’t understand the meaning of the word. They understand entitlement though.
Some of the stuff on here in recent weeks/months is unacceptable to me. There is no engaging or debating with last night. No rationalising. Just plain old nastiness and ignorance. The perpetrators could say ‘if you don’t like it, do one’. Fine, no problem. I do believe the vitriol will drive people away and if the owners of the forum are happy with that, fine. Maybe it just reflects society.
The club has some truly rubbish ‘support’ in my view. Shame really given the cadre of supporters that endured the Evans years and even the survivors of Ferguson and Duncan’s time from the hardy 11k and less.
The sadness is that the posters and posts in this particular thread are excellent, along with others who no longer engage with this forum. It’s for them to say why or otherwise, but I have my suspicions.
For me, it’s better things to do. The support last season in the ground was amazing, given our uncompetitiveness. It contrasts markedly with what I see on here.
Sport is an escape. It is something where you get to meet and interact with interesting and good people too. It is also a passion - always was for me. To the extent of whatever was going on in life, in PR I’d be 100% engaged with it. That won’t change.
Has the club made mistakes? Yes, too many. Will the club be promoted this year? Unlikely. Relegated? Unlikely. Sold? Quite possibly. New manager? Maybe. Who knows.
I was following this club when the only info was a Playfair annual (small thing with stats), Match of the Week in black and white and players wearing black boots apart from Alan Ball. It will always be my club as long as it and/or I exist.
Whether that includes TWTD, who knows but with the current trend, that’s unlikely, sadly. The following from Kipling never loses its impact for me and I completely understand why a quote from it is on Wimbledon’s Centre Court.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46473/if--- |  | | |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 14:58 - Aug 13 with 335 views | LuciBlue |
Negativity will always be louder, even with fewer numbers. |  |
| |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 15:13 - Aug 13 with 311 views | azuremerlangus |
A cup game so not entirely shocked at the outcome.
I do worry about the lack of ability to get a reasonable performance and therefore a result against a 4th tier side with a half decent squad of players.
The OH saga grates because it appears to be a lack of commitment - and commitment is expected to be a given between club, players and supporters. |  |
| |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 17:19 - Aug 13 with 215 views | flykickingbybgunn |
I suppose I have always been what some on here would call a happy clapper. I cant help it, I'm a glass half full kind of bloke.
Any body that has been following Town for more than two minutes knows what the downsides are like. I'm just glad we are not there at the moment. Football is a roller coaster ride. Ups and downs all the time. That is why we love it. At the moment we are on an up. Enjoy it and ride it for all it's worth.
If Hutch wants away or needs a moment to get his head straight then let him. As he is he is of zero value to us.
If he needs to be sold then we will have made a handsome profit on him and in effect had his services for the last two years for free ! Plus we will have a shed load of cash to reinvest in the team.
Clap, clap, clap. |  | | |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 17:33 - Aug 13 with 181 views | BeachBlue |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 12:34 - Aug 13 by SheffordBlue |
I really dislike both the "happy clapper" and "bedwetter" terms. I think most issues are far more shades of grey than black and white. I hope I come across on here as someone who engages in good faith and some of the things I try to do (but recognise that maybe I don't always get right!) are:
1) Acknowledge concerns - I think that recognizing that people's alternate viewpoints often have points that are fair can help.
2) Posing things as opinions rather than facts. E.g "I think that" rather than "It is". A lot of the threads that seem to go off the rails here on lots of topics seem to be when people pose things as absolute certainties when in reality they are an opinion.
3) Asking things as questions rather than making statements - "Might it be the case that.....?" tends to evoke a different response than just providing a contradictory viewpoint.
4) (Probably the one I struggle most with!) - just recognising when to walk away from a thread. Sometimes viewpoints are just too far apart to resolve on a platform like this.
Hopefully that helps. I think the same thinking applies to the more naturally pessimistic amongst us trying to convince the naturally optimistic that they are right! |
Please accept this internet fist bump of approval for your post. |  | | |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 18:30 - Aug 13 with 126 views | ghostofescobar |
But we haven’t won the league yet. Or signed Salah. But the rest of the league haven’t already just thrown in the towel, which they should have done, cos we should be that good. But Philogene is out for the season, or isn’t, but whatever, it’s his fault. But Clarke should have scored 10 by now and won us the league. But McKenna hasn’t played 15 different formation/tactical changes in a single game yet, he’s so inflexible. But we’ve had one season in the prem in 20 years, so we should be champions of the world by now. Or something………… |  |
| |
| I’ve been trying to FIRE people up for Sunday, and highlight the negativity on 20:13 - Aug 13 with 65 views | unstableblue |
I agree the forum and just the general Ipswich fan diaspora has been appalling since Birmingham away, and that was a performance in very trying circumstances.
This vibe has been lurking in the shadows since the terrible end to last season. And it wasn’t going to take much for it to rise into a dark shadow over the season.
We all get why this negativity is here… a terrible Premier League season, and of course some Town fans who will look to the half pint being empty.
But the big concern is the impact on the players and the project.
Confidence is everything, and ours is low.
Seasons can flip on a knife edge… look at Luton, ours could go t!ts up quickly.
What the TWTD fan base and forum need to focus on is creating a MASSIVE atmosphere on Sunday (at 12, sighs) that can spur the players on to breaking this confidence issue.
We are in danger of creating what none of us want.
BACK THE MANAGER AND PLAYERS
COYFB |  |
| |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 20:34 - Aug 13 with 39 views | IndependentlyBlue |
Been following the town, up or down, for almost 50 years, and been on and off here since the Rival days. Like OP probably see myself more in the glass half side of things.
FWIW l try to keep out of big debates in that l read through those threads but mostly stay out of joining in. Usually find that there’s a wide-ish cohort of posters l lean towards agreeing with but if l don’t have anything new to add can’t see the point in joining in.
Hedgesitter? Possibly. But it’s only a message board, not life and death. None of us is going to win anything on here in terms of our opinions. Most of us and our opinions aren’t likely to be changed radically by what we’ve read on here.
Having said it’s ‘only’ a message board l’m often humbled by the wisdom of some of the posters, and by the board in general, when someone makes a cry for help on here. There’s so much more that holds us together than there is that tears us apart. Worth remembering that when the vitriol starts to fly.
They’re opinions, that’s all. Like belly buttons we all have one.
As to upvotes/downvotes what possible relevance could they have to your life? |  |
| Better to stay silent and be thought a fool than open your mouth and remove all doubt |
| |
| A message to the more positive supporter on 20:44 - Aug 13 with 20 views | TJS |
If we can get away with a draw on Sunday and beat Preston and Derby we should survive August with our automatic promotion hopes firmly intact. That’s how I’m looking at it. |  | | |
| |
By continuing to use the site, you agree to our use of cookies and to abide by our Terms and Conditions.
