Fans Comment
Jim Wilcox

Farewell my love...
21 October 2005

This is my 40th season as a committed Evertonian and my last as a season ticket holder.  Last night I made the decision to give up the passion of my life and `spend more time with my family`.

So what has brought me to this momentous landmark in my life?

Strangely not the present plight of our team but the ToffeeWeb article earlier this week by Colin Dempsey! It made me face up to something I guess I have known deep down for a very long time; that the love of my life is way past her best and that she never loved me anyway!

But let me go back to the beginning. 1966, when the excitement of `the great come-back` convinced me to foresake the local team and join the small band of Evertonians who fortnightly made the trip from Preston to Goodison via an often protracted stop-off at a sea-front alehouse in Southport. You see, what we went for was the quality, the pure brilliance of the Youngs, Balls and Harveys who made up our team in those days and which set us apart from all the others.

Of course, it wasn`t always that good and even the great Catterick lost his magic touch eventually and passed the mantle on to Bingham, Lee(oh dear!) and eventually Howard, who in time transported us back to The School of Science we all so loved.

I guess my first unease came when, twelve months too late, Joe Royle returned `home` and started talking of `Dogs of War`. Another Cup success notwithstanding, like many of my generation I felt tainted by that sobriquet but settled with my conscience on a `needs must` basis.

Since then, of course, it`s been all downhill - both on and off the pitch. Whatever his failings, when `Uncle John Moores` was at the helm, you always felt he would know the` right thing` to do and it was a sad day for all of us when `the family` felt they had better ways to spend their money.

Not that any Everton Board has ever had much time for the ordinary supporter. I can relate tales of ticket cock-ups, apalling PR disasters and outright disdain from the top ad nauseam. But nothing, just nothing, matches the gross incompetence of the present regime. Paul really spelt it out in his piece and made me realise that my love affair with Everton was doomed-because this isn`t the Everton of my youth, or even my middle age — it`s an Everton of money grabbers and piss-takers and I want no part of it as I move into retirement.

So whether Moyes goes or stays is irrelevant to me - I have no joy in his brand of football whether we finish 4th or 20th - because I know `The People's Club` is a cheating hussey who took me for a fortune and, in recent years, gave me nothing but heartache in return.

Jim Wilcox

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