By Chris Chaplin
December 14 2003

I’ve read Razcal’s article and well written though it is I find it to be fundamentally flawed and here’s why.Firstly let us address love of the club as a concept and that such love as the supporters have must be an unconditional love and not dependent on circumstances.

I would argue that it is not possible to hold the same kind of unconditional love as one holds for another person when the focus of that affection is an object, which for all it’s component human parts Leicester Football Club plc is.

However let us just consider the kind of unconditional love that Razcal advocates and for the sake of this discussion accept that it is indeed the emotion that should drive supporters.

Without personalising this too much I was brought up in the immediate post-war era of the 1940s and 1950s. My parents and I lived in what would now be considered poverty but then was the norm for working class people. My Mother took pride in that we were clean, honest and hardworking and she was a strict disciplinarian in the maintenance of those values. My Father was a hardworking man and while he shared my Mother’s values was not the main disciplining of offspring department yet I feared disappointing him dreadfully as he was such a lovely man. I loved my parents dearly until they died and I never had any doubt that they loved me.

Their love for me was unconditional but that did not stop them administering discipline which in those days could involve a sharp clip around the ear or the threat of the cane. They also pointed out when they thought I was in error and they were usually right. At the time I resented it but I have learned that the values that they instilled me have made me the person I am and enabled me to achieve such that I have.

We were not rich in a material sense and nor were we an especially demonstrative family in showing our love for each other but I always knew that my parents loved me and that it was unconditional.

I think that in retrospect then it may be felt that it is an unreasonable proposition that such love can exist for a company.

I am passionate in my support for Tigers but I do not love Tigers and do not believe I am capable of doing so and in my view the use of this most intense and personal of emotions in this context is to devalue it and the argument.

Right with that out of the way let me address the situation as I see it.

I have supported Tigers for a long time, not as long as some but longer than many but since moving to the South West my presence at matches had been sparse. However a change in personal circumstances freed up time and money for my wife and I and so somewhat strangely some may think I bought two season tickets in the Members’ Stand this year. Now given my usual commercial view of things I thought that this was a strange course to take when Tigers were not at their best. Indeed in many ways I missed a good part of the “Glory Years” so from this rather seemingly perverse decision and our attendance at most games this season (we even arranged some surgery that my wife had to undergo so that it did not unduly interfere with home match attendance) I think it is not unreasonable for me to boast that I am indeed a Tigers’ supporter and have been so through some thick and thin times.

It is not in my nature to say nothing when something needs saying and as far as Tigers are concerned things have needed to be said. I would argue that those who say nothing and just hope something will turn up do themselves and the club a disservice.

The players and the management are mature sensible human beings and they will surely appreciate the concerns that are voiced. The voicing of these concerns neither diminishes the club nor devalues the support of the individual

When one looks at the players that have passed through and are at the club now there is a rich vein of talent and I would argue most strongly that the talent that we potentially see before us now at Welford Road is outstanding in a collegiate sense when set against those that have gone before. I often say that on paper Tigers should and could win every game and given this talent so they should.

This is not arrogance or being spoilt it is a matter of fact, ask any honest opposition supporter. Even down here in that most rabid of rugby heartlands the Gloucester faithful are perplexed as to how such a talented back division can produce so little.

The Tigers’ pack, decimated as it was by World Cup demands, played manfully under the courageous leadership of Josh Kronfeld and once strengthened by the arrival of Stewart Campbell and Jim Richards never let us down.

Another fact is that aside from the very serious loss of Geordan Murphy we entered the World Cup period with a virtually full strength back division and yet it is in Tigers’ back play that the collegiate performance has been found wanting.

I like many of you saw Pez and Gibson play last season, they were outstanding and yet until just this last week they have looked ordinary. Daryl Gibson made a spectacular start to the season but then somehow went into his shell why was this? Why, given that ball was available, albeit perhaps not always of the highest quality, was it not used more expertly and with more skill by the half-backs and backs?

Why in spite the effect of the World Cup upon us being known was there no move to augment the locks and to rely instead on largely untried youngsters against other premiership clubs who had been left almost entirely unscathed in this area? Why when Buckland tragically broke his leg was the decision made not to immediately recruit Jim Richards or someone of his ilk?

These are not issues that require great knowledge of coaching they are simple strategic decisions that were mishandled.

Why was Ollie Smith played out of position for so long? Why was Healey not started at his acknowledged best position of scrum-half until just last week?

So many questions to decisions that are inexplicable to many inside and outside of Tigers.

Now I have no strong feelings about Dean Richards as man, I’ve never met him, neither do I know what goes on inside Tigers but what I do know, and the results support my view, is that something is not right and has not been right in the way our backs have been playing for some while.

I cannot accept that such a collection of highly skilled players have conspired to abandon their craft as soon as they arrived at Welford Road. What I do know is that watching each successive group of backs under two different backs’ coaches over the past couple of seasons (Christmas 2001 until now) the style they play is the same. This is not natural. It’s not human nature. The system looks predictable and old fashioned. Why is this?

I agree that both as a player and a coach Deano has done great things for Tigers. He like all of us has needed his good luck and he has also received his share of unwelcome bad luck.

However the steady decline in Tigers’ performances has not been sudden or coincidental with the World Cup. I recall bemoaning the standard of our back play as long ago as March of the 2001/2 season at which time Tigers had carried all before them up until Christmas, then stuttered and faltered. But in the end it was another league title and another HEC. Strangely enough this last success is in my view the source of Tigers’ current problems as the management seemingly decided that “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it” didn’t glance over their shoulders to see what was going on behind them and now the chasing pack are not coming around a still distant corner but have roared past them. Poor strategic management at best. Complacency at worst.

If Tigers’ supporters have too high an expectation of their team, an apologist concept which is anathema to me, then they were encouraged in their view by the unrealistic expectations voiced by the team management who urged that they “keep the faith” and “all will be well” and famously last Christmas “if the results go our way we can still win every competition”

I would be delighted to see Deano turn things around as he been promising to for the past year or so but just as “cometh the hour cometh the man” so is it true that times and people change and maybe just maybe the time has come for a change at Tigers.

An argument is put forward that changing the coach is not the answer and Sarries is cited in support of this argument. I would counter this by directing you to Bath where a change of coach has turned a side dodging relegation by the thinnest of hair’s breadths to that of probable Champions. At Saints and Wasps where Wayne Smith and Warren Gatland have done great work since their respective arrivals. At Harlequins where Mark Evans has really turned things around. At Gloucester where Nigel Melville turned the perennial under achievers into Champions. At London Irish where Brendan Venter produced cup winners from relegation candidates. It is a weak and barren position to cite the puzzle that is Saracens as an argument against change.

The conspiracy theory? There is no grand conspiracy, although I do wonder at the severity of the suspensions that Tigers’ players get for misdemeanours that see other players treated far more leniently. But all in all there is, in my judgement, no conspiracy either in the cloistered offices of the RFU., EPR. or ERC. Nor do Tigers get treated with any more or less competence by match officials than do other sides. The problem here is that other sides now “play the officials” much better than do Tigers who first perfected this modern rugby craft as they did so many others.

Europe and the difference in the Salary Cap rules. Well it could explain away any failure by English clubs in Europe but I suspect it will prove an unnecessary sanctuary for apologists as an English club will win the HEC.

Finally I believe that were the non playing management fulfilling their promise to me when I attended a Focus Group back in August that communication would improve between the club and the supporters there would be much less discontent in spite of the poor performances on the pitch. When things are tough everybody needs to at least feel they are part of a common purpose and that is just not the case at Tigers.

I remember a junior member of the management at Tigers once saying to me that it seemed to him that I supported the players in spite of the idiots who run the club. I have to say that the discussions that I have had with David Clayton, Peter Wheeler and Peter Tom do not give me any reason to agree with that view but I do gain an impression that the playing side of the club and the commercial side of the club themselves lack unity and that the club remains fractious within itself as the traditional rugby aspect struggles to reconcile itself with the new and in my view often ill conceived and executed marketing initiatives.

In spite of all this though I am a Tigers’ supporter and I vow these to be truths. I shall continue to drive around the country to home and away games. Shout myself hoarse. Rail against the injustice of referees to the efforts of my heroes. Spend my money. Wear my out of date shirt and other Tiger accoutrements with pride, while looking more than a little foolish. Take the brickbats in my local as I appear after another loss and accept the sympathy of opposition supporters or just nod modestly when Tigers win. I will always support the players. I will never abuse them either during a match or at any other time. I will continue to say what I think without the intention of giving offence. I will be true to myself. I will lead the Luddite tendency with the smell of Dubbin wafting over us. I will be passionate in my support of Tigers. I will not let them fail.

So the way forward?

Well Razcal in his article advocates more patience. Rich W has advocated evolution rather than revolution, although I seem to recall that he had said on an earlier occasion that if things had not improved by Christmas then he would need to review his position on the perch with the other doves. Others in jest say sack the board and plan demonstrations in front of the clubhouse.

I guess it’s a simple choice. Stay as we are and hope that things improve or something turns up but accept that perhaps Tigers’ will continue an inexorable drift into longer term mediocrity or instead make a fundamental change sooner rather than later to the coaching style or even the structure and risk things not getting any better but then could they get any worse?

Well I suppose Rotherham could start winning all their matches!