EVEN THE BEST CAN GET IT WRONG!
THE other day I was giving the office (okay, cellar) a much-needed tidy up when I stumbled across a magazine in which a columnist was laying out his opinion that Alex Ferguson would be sacked as Manchester United manager by Christmas.
On closer inspection the organ turned out to be long-defunct monthly "Football Today", but the points being made in this particular edition, published in 1988, were intriguing.
Said columnist felt Ferguson's team was playing with no flair, which would not go down well at all with the paying public on the Stretford End, and were losing games too, which presumably went down even worse.
The benefit of hindsight is obvious here - in 1988 nobody knew the Scotsman would go on to such successes. Some could predict it, of course, but no way could it have been guaranteed.
So who was the writer of this particular poison pen letter? I hear you ask. Which one of the grubby Fleet Street hacks had rattled out this latest character assassination of maybe the greatest manager the British game has ever seen?
Ferguson has plenty of enemies in the press, of course, but this particular missive came from the hand of someone a little closer to home - George Best.
The point is this: everyone gets criticised at some time or another, and such criticism can come from anyone.
Most frequently, it seems, the hardest people to please, and those who are quickest to open their mouths to criticise, are the Wembley crowd.
Having watched games at both the old Wembley, and the shiny, new, £5-a-burger Wembley, I can confirm that no supporters are as scathing of their own players as those who follow the national team.
They were in the spotlight again at the weekend, with their reaction to Ashley Cole's truly horrific backpass that allowed Kazakhstan to score in the World Cup qualifier.
Immediately, I'm going to discount the argument that 'for the thousands he is paid, he should not make such mistakes' because that's a theory that has no basis in fact.
Other players would not have got such a reaction, though, and that is a fact.
Cole is a whipping boy because most football supporters see him as the embodiment of everything that is wrong with the modern game - the shallow celebrity, trophy wife, obsession with all things material and complete removal from the world in which the majority of the 90,000 fans who were at Saturday's game - they all do little to help his cause.
Even the Chron's Chelsea fan dislikes Cole, and wants him to fail in everything he does.
So, come to think of it, Saturday was perfect for England fans. Their team one, and they got to dish out some serious verbal abuse to the last player on the planet they want to see have any success.
Speaking of criticism, it appears there have been one or two texts in the Chron recently which have ruffled feathers in the Sixfields boardroom.
The issues have been discussed at great length elsewhere, but here's my abridged opinion on the matter.
I don't think it is in the interests of anyone to censor what the supporters think, and I don't feel the club would ever suggest such an outcome.
But the important thing to stress is that these are the opinions of a very vocal minority. As with most things online, whether they are weblogs or comments on news stories, it appears the most extreme viewpoints are often the ones that rise to the surface.
Which is a shame because such formats are really the perfect platform for democracy, and the best advice I can give for anyone with any opinion on these matters is to become part of the process and make them arenas for reasoned, intelligent debate and not the breeding ground for extremity which far too many of them are at present.
