Doing the 92 is Daniel Storey’s odyssey to every English football league club in a single season. This is club 87/92. The best way to follow his journey and read all of the previous pieces is by subscribing here
There has always been a stability to Tranmere Rovers that I have admired. That will sound counterintuitive to those who have closely followed their path from third tier to non-league and back, but there’s something decidedly stoic about the place. I think it stems from being the third club of three in an area obsessed by football and that status having never changed.
That consistency is reinforced by the club’s supporters, who have come to Prenton Park in roughly similar numbers ever since the fall from the heady days of three consecutive Division One playoff campaigns in the 1990s. Since 2007, home attendances have averaged somewhere between 5,100 and 7,000 every season.
In that time, Tranmere have played league games against Leeds United and Leicester City, North Ferriby United and AFC Fylde and most teams in between. Everyone who comes here just keeps on keeping on regardless. Prenton Park may not always have been a temple to great success, but permanence has its rightful place.
Over the last year, however, Tranmere Rovers’ world has shifted on its axis. Reports of a potential takeover from the Palios family – who have been here 10 years – surfaced early in 2024. We now know that the party granted an exclusivity agreement is led by Joe Tacopina, Donald Trump’s former lawyer. It includes rapper A$AP Rocky, partner of Rihanna. The purchase price was suggested to be £15m, but we know very little else about the identity of others and the intentions of the consortium.
In February, the takeover moved closer after A$AP Rocky was found not guilty of firing a gun at a former friend. All reports, including word from chairman Mark Palios, is that it will be completed before the start of next season.
All of this hoopla therefore strikes as distinctly un-Tranmere, who have only once had a non-local owner (American businessman Bruce Osterman in the 1980s) and that ended in the club almost going out of business. In an interview with the excellent A Trip To The Moon, Osterman effectively admitted that he never had the money for the project. History determined that former chairman Peter Johnson was deliberately choosy about who he would sell to.
Tranmere Rovers 0-3 Doncaster Rovers (Friday 18 April)
- Game no: 84/92
- Miles: 226
- Cumulative miles: 16,198
- Total goals seen: 219
- The one thing I’ll remember in May: I’m a sucker for a mural and Tranmere Rovers have one of the best in the business, on the side of a house across the road from Prenton Park. Go and see it.
This is a great leap into the unknown. Cynicism isn’t just permissible – it’s advised. Prenton Park is on valuable land. There is no suggestion that potential owners are looking to take advantage of any situation at Tranmere’s expense, but then that’s precisely the point: no supporter knows their intentions at all.
The initial noise at the impending change has also gone too quiet for some fans, who understandably fear silence. There have been too few updates, too few public statements for their liking. A football club takeover requires patience from all, but in that information gap worries are born and grow wild. The sense of permanence itself starts to blur.
The great complicating factor in all this is decline on the pitch, first gradual and then plummeting to the point that relegation back to non-league appeared as a probability. Were Tranmere supporters reflecting upon a season of top-half progress, or simply avoiding any panic in the spring, the unknowns of this takeover would surely be far less appetising.
This season will mark the sixth in succession that Tranmere have finished in a lower position than their last. Since their controversial relegation to the fourth tier in 2020 (after Covid-19 suspension and points-per-game calculations), life on the pitch has become increasingly uninspiring.
Football is a meritocracy with league tables as the only judgement that matters, but for Tranmere Rovers to be the 88th-best club in England is unacceptable. For most of the last eight months, that was the height of their ambition. This season has caused trust to be eroded and deep divisions to form. Whatever happens next, this must be the nadir not the new norm.
Having taken eight points from their first four league matches, Nigel Adkins then limped to 10 points from their next 14. The Palios family, who had previously been proactive in removing managers when things stopped working, took the opposite approach. Mark gave Adkins a vote of confidence after another terrible run.
The spectre of the takeover became unhelpful, for it warped faith in the current manager into perceived carelessness – won’t be our problem soon. How unfair that is on the Palios ownership will vary according to the opinions of each supporter, but protest groups began to form. Accusations of giving up grew after a January transfer window in which the club signed three loan players (aged 19, 20 and 21). Two of them played three league minutes between them; the other started one game after February.
Adkins was eventually sacked, when his position became untenable in every way. A 1-0 home defeat to Accrington marked 10 games without a win and saw Tranmere two points from the bottom two, five points behind Harrogate Town in 21st. The atmosphere at Prenton Park was toxic, the relationship between the club’s top and bottom fragmenting in a fog of mistrust.
Tranmere’s saviour was an unlikely figure. Andy Crosby had been Adkins’ assistant, so was viewed by fans as part of the problem rather than its probable cure. He was installed as interim as a needs-must measure. More of the same and Tranmere would go down.
The difference under Crosby was astounding, not least because he changed the team tactically (ostensibly more attacking) and was prepared to leave out higher earners and senior players to generate greater competition for places. Between his appointment and the end of the season, only Doncaster Rovers and Chesterfield took more points per game in League Two than Tranmere Rovers.
As that happened, those frustrated supporters began to come closer again to the bosom of their club. It is a repeated myth about football supporters across the country: that they are in some way overly demanding, needy or entitled. The opposite is usually true. Football supporters put up with a lot of nonsense – money, time, energy. In return they ask for a club that they can be proud of. Trust may become bent beyond complete repair; pride almost never is.
If and when this takeover is completed, and the identity of the new guardians of this club are revealed, it’s tempting to see Crosby as a bellwether. Football supporters don’t usually want their club to be rolled in glitter. Most invite new investment because the finances of the game’s desperation culture provoke such priorities, but that can never change the fabric of what makes their club theirs.
Crosby has repaired that fabric. He is a face of the old regime who has flourished and should be part of the new family. Cast him aside in favour of a more glamorous name and you begin to wonder whether these people are taking care to learn about Tranmere Rovers at all. This league season taught us one thing: for every Wrexham there is a Carlisle United.
There is great potential here. For all the consistency and stoicism that is to be admired, there are literal and figurative empty spaces where good news can rush in. There is no academy and there should be. There are improvements in fan facilities and recruitment structures that may precipitate growth. One of the things that consistently amazes me about football clubs is how ostensibly unassociated aspects impact upon each other. Build things and good news quickly builds.
There is also uncertainty. Tranmere retains a deeply loyal core support, given what happens on the other side of the water. Everyone agrees that change is needed, given the diminishing returns of the last decade. But there is a distinct danger in changing too much before you know why you’re changing it.
No Tranmere supporter can tell you what their club will look like in August. That is exciting and daunting in equal measure. New moods are important. New life is necessary. New everything all at once is a giant leap into the uncertain.
Daniel Storey has set himself the goal of visiting all 92 grounds across the Premier League and EFL this season. You can follow his progress via our interactive map and find every article (so far) here
from Football - The i Paper https://ift.tt/jSmFcIr
Post a Comment
EmoticonClick to see the code!
To insert emoticon you must added at least one space before the code.