The Thoughts of Captain Autumn

It's hard watching your children grow up, leaving the carefree tomfoolery of their early years behind them. I love to mess around with the kids, act like a fool to make them laugh, but my eldest is getting to the age where he's starting to find me embarrassing almost as often as he finds me entertaining. Sometimes I see him looking at me and thinking "You really ARE an idiot". And it's only going to get worse. As the kids get older they'll realise that although they assumed when they were little that their Dad was fabulous and knew everything and could do everything, he was actually just a mediocre underachiever, muddling through, trying to survive.

I guess my hope is that when they're much older, as old as I am now, maybe they'll realise that in spite of all that I still managed to be a half decent father. And thus in my own small way, something of the hero they first imagined me to be.

I was down at the Kassam Stadium yesterday. There's a new board up on the fence at the open end saying Welcome to Oxford United - Proud Member of Blue Square Premier. I can't say for sure who put it up, but my money is on Blue Square, since out of the thousands of people with an affiliation of one sort or another for Oxford I defy anyone to find more than four who are proud to be in the Blue Square Premier. There are many emotions which I could link to our status in this division - embarrassment, humiliation, dismay, rage - but pride doesn't figure high up the list.

Being an Oxford fan has got even more surreal this season with us being - and correct me if I'm wrong, but I doubt it - the most televised live team in the country outside of the big four. Possibly even including them. Granted only on Sultana Santana Setanta Sports, but even so. When they've shown our games against Histon and Droylsden (I'm not making this up - those really are the next two live games for Oxford on Setanta) and Torquay, that will make six of our first 15 games. How many other clubs have 40% of their matches televised live?! These are strange times indeed...

The Histon game is tomorrow night. Histon, if you're unaware (and don't be embarrassed because I imagine most people are) is a village in Cambridgeshire. It has a population of 4,450. The entire population of the village is lower than our average home attendance. When we play them at home, they can all come and there will be room to spare in the ground.

Long time readers of this weblog will know that as Oxford have visited these teams for the first time, I have often taken the opportunity to learn something about the history of the towns in question. Well, no offence to the people of Histon, but I don't really have a lot to work with here. According to Wikipedia, Histon is joined with another village, Impington, and they are home to six pubs. After that it goes downhill. During the Norman Conquest, William the Conqueror "passed this way". They make Sun Pat peanut butter there. That's pretty much your lot.