OK everyone, here is the big picture: Carlisle on the Internet. It could be worth printing - things on the screen are hard to read.
This just started out as a question in my head as I read the postings of Carlisle fans in London and Bradford offering trips to Scunthorpe. So I sent out the message - 'where are you?'. I got some 40 replies - and some surprising ones at that!
Basically Carlisle fans on the Internet come in five quite different flavours, each represented by 8 -10 respondents:-
These guys live in Carlisle, Penrith, Aspatria and Thursby. They have the advantage of seeing all the home games. They have the disadvantage of living in Cumbria, well ... according to the second group. This group is big-time important to the other groups because they can give the rest of us:-
You will find them around Manchester, Staines, Bath, Brighton, Barnoldswick, Dundee, Rayleigh; so on and so forth. They come from Carlisle but are looking for greener pastures and more dosh. They go to lots of away games and sometimes write about them. This is important to the Warwick Road regulars who can't get to all away games and really important to other exiles and the exotics (see below). The star of this group is Mark Antony Ward from Gillingham, Dorset who gets to 60% of home games and most away games. Shouldn't the club give him a free season ticket??
They think Carlisle City is sort of OK but don't want to live there. They have reservations about certain aspects of Carlisle life - like gannin' doon Botchergate and getting into a punch up on a Saturday night. Shouldn't that be Botchergate??
Another notable is Steve Smith of Stockport who is from Carlisle but was conceived in Silloth. So that's what they do in Silloth on a slow Thursday night! Hunter Davis ought to be in this group, I've seen him at Carlisle games in London!
You will find them in Oxford, Durham, High Wycombe, Bristol and indeed anywhere where a clutch of A levels will gain entry. The advantage of this group is that they all get free Internet access (I can tell from your email addresses!) but the downside is that at the crucial times of Xmas and Easter they can't get on to it from home! They go to lots of away games too.
This group have Dads who are from Carlisle (like Rebecca from Preston) or Grannies from Whitehaven (like David from the Isle of Man). Bluddy 'ell, if John F. Kennedy can go around saying 'Ich bin ein Berliner' David has NO trouble saying 'Ich bin ein Carlisle Supporter Gadgie'. Another member of this group is Foster from Gloster (this isn't a wind-up is it?) who has grandparents from Wigton.
You will find them in:-
...and the latest member, Marcel de Vries from Holland who we should make an honorary gadgie and show him the sights of Botchergate on a Saturday night!
This group do not get to many games, my last one was away to Sunderland in the Cup two years ago (bloody hard to get a ticket as well), but are active members of the Internet group and are desperate for match write-ups.
Well that rounds up the composition of the group, I'll just finish off with...
What a very disparate load of gadgies and gadgesses we all are! Some of us love living is Carlisle, as do my battalion of relatives in the city. Some of us wouldn't touch it with a bargepole. Some of us want to see life through the windows of Yates' Wine Lodge in English St; some of us want to see life across the Golden Horn, Table Mountain or Cook Strait. But the one thing that really binds us all together is this shared ... what is it? an obsession? A passion? A fixation? ... on this team in blue. You can see it in the newsgroup postings: the exaltation of the Tranmere win; the psychological torture of the Wigan defeat.
Where does all of this leave us now? Actually that's easy, it leaves us from Vancouver to the Warwick Road End to Istanbul to Perth to Wellington saying 'Come on the Blues!' in the Hereford game on Saturday. Warwick Road Regulars we want your postings on it!
God, I wish the club could read this!
Regards,
Jeff Steel
Melbourne, Australia
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