Quote: JonB95 "I want Wigan Ath. to be relegated, if anything to see how much of their fanbase stays with them once they are back in the lower leagues. (arguably where they belong)
Same with Sale. Be interesting to see what the media would say about a national Premiership without a single northern team. (unless of course Newcastle come back, which is looking increasingly likely. Though they have a fanbase about the size of Salford's!)'"
Why do we belong in the lower leagues when for the last 8 years we've been good enough to stay in the PL?
To put that into perspective. We're 80 years old this year and have spent 10% of that time in the Country's top league. We have only been in the league for 34 years, meaning we were promoted from the very bottom division to the very top in just 26 years and then stayed there. If you like percentages, we've spent 23.5% of our league lives in the top division. In that time clubs such as West Ham, Newcastle, Bolton, Sunderland (twice), Derby, Wolves (twice) Sheff Utd and Birmingham (twice) who I would consider to be bigger clubs than us have all been relegated. Two of them by us. Some of them have never returned and have even been relegated again since. The only team currently in the Premier League that we haven't beat is Norwich but in the same breath we haven't lost to them either. We are the only team to be promoted to the top flight but never relegated (or something like that anyway)
We may only have a small fanbase, but until that equals points or goals we couldn't give a flying f*ck and I'm sure the majority of Leeds, Sheff Utd, Sheff Weds etc etc fans would be happy to sit in a ground with 7000 empty seats if it meant being in the top flight. Similarly I reckon most Geordies would be happy to see a few of their fanbase drop off if it meant winning a trophy.
So, I'm interested to hear. Why do we belong in the lower leagues?