Deadline day approaches - what does it say about the fans?

I blogged much earlier in the Summer and said that it was the start of the silly season. As the last season closed and teams were deciding what players they would discard and where the holes were in their squad, it felt like the silly season. As 1st July came around and clubs could officially announce their new signings, it felt sillier. I have no word to describe the period that's about to arrive - transfer deadline day. The business that's done in the last day, as clubs engage in brinksmanship - whoever blinks first loses money - is amazing.

In a world where players have no concept of the type of salary that the fans live on, they and their agents fight over the extra few grand a week or a better goal bonus that eventually makes little difference to their existence. Clubs that squander millions of players that turn out to be flops, squabble with other clubs about the different valuations each carry for a player. The selling club overvalues heavily, the buying club undervalues heavily and the player can get left in the middle. Where else would you force someone who doesn't want to work for you to stay and "become part of out future" or "stay and fight for your place." Not that the players are slaves to the clubs - far from it.

So we head towards the final day and Sky Sports are already hyping it up, with talk of world record, British record and club record transfers. With some heavy spending by the two Manchester clubs, Chelsea and possibly a big deal to come from

Arsenal the spending this Summer may top £1 billion. Is this the way that the world wants to spend it's money?

But after all that we, the fans, love it. We love the drama of the transfer window, the speculation about who we are going to buy, who might be in for one of our players or who we might have just missed out on. The figures seem to pass over out heads. A player that we have booed relentlessly when they played for another team is suddenly one of our heroes and the short sales go through the roof. The word that is often attached to football fans is "fickle" but I see it as something different to that altogether.

At any club, the average time a player or a manager stays there is probably now down to under 3 years. A fan is there for life, and has to adapt to the changes in chairman, director of football, manager and players. The fans will often support the club that their father and grandfather and so on supported. The lineage often goes back as far as the club itself. This is the opposite of fickle - this is long-term dedication from people that work hard all week to put their hand in their pocket for a few goals, a pie and a pint.

As the silly season gets to it's silliest point, I ask the clubs to keep their fans dreams alive. It's often these dreams that get us through the rest of our lives.

3 weeks break leads me to expand the blog

I've now returned from three weeks holiday. A three week break brings lots of thinking time but the return to reality and activity is tougher than I remember.

I've kept physically active whilst away, with a gym and swimming pool on the complex I've been staying on. But a lot of time on the road, by the pool, in the gym and on the beach gives you plenty of time to think about what you are doing and where you want to start going next with everything you do.

I think that it is good (and it was good) to have a period of reflection and contemplation. It gives you a chance to determine whether you think that you're on the right track and to plot the way forward without the everyday distractions of work life. It also enables a little "blue sky thinking" as there exposure to a different routine and a different culture can have you thinking about things in different ways. I have looked at the direction I'm heading in and I broadly think that it's where I want to be going.

It's now thinking about heading out of the break and back into my life that's occupying my mind. I landed and got home in Sunday evening and it was back to work at 7.30am on Monday, so there was no real transition to be had. It was a case of holiday mode as is went to bed and work mode when I got up the next morning. It was just the way it had to be with three weeks off - there was no spare time to be had! So it was straight back into it, which can sometimes be the best way to get on, although I don't really feel like that the the moment! I can just about see the wood from the trees at work now, after a few days of catching up. I just wish I could say the same about everything else I do.

I've looked at my blogs and I can see that there is definitely a Sunderland bias developing in terms of content. The plight of the club this Summer has occupied my mind and has obviously occupied my blog as well. My resolution is to look at the wider football situation and produce more (probably slightly shorter) blogs about the events of football as they occur.