A different perspective

Hi...some of you may remember me from the old forum, we laughed, we cried together, and I enjoyed the witty banter and shared pain! I have been absent this season from posting, though have regularly read the contributions.
My reason for absence is that I became Chairman of a football club myself, Bath City FC. We too had a disastrous start to the season, but unlike Bolton, did not gain enough points to avoid relegation (see, positivity there!)
Just thought I'd shove in my two pennyworth in...based on things I have learned this year. Running a football club is immensely difficult, and one of the most difficult things is that there is so much that goes on behind closed doors, which has to remain private for lots of reasons, it gets very frustrating when you know that if only you could explain fully the situation, people would understand some of the decisions. I have been hugely fortunate in the support I and the team have been given in what has been a very very disappointing season results wise, even without people knowing the full story. I can totally understand most being very upset, critical even, after all, if you dont have passion and desire for success in football, are accepting of bad results, I dont entirely know what you are in it for! I know running a small conference premier club (we still are till next weekend!) is very very different from running a club like Bolton, but I am sure some of the challenges are similar, they just have more noughts behind them on the income and expenditure side.
Bath City is a part time team in a league where 21 out of 24 are full time, 14 are ex league clubs. We have had to go to Barrow and Gateshead on Tuesday nights, we dont have overnight stops before matches, a lot of the players go straight into work from the coach and recovery time before the next match is minimal. That side of it is as far from the Premiership as you could imagine...and I love it. The passion, desire and commitment shown by the Bath City squad equals that shown by any fully professional team, and i'd say in some cases exceeds it, when you look at what we pay in return for the commitment we have been given. It gives me as much pleasure when Bath City scored two brilliant goals at Darlington in the last 8 mins to grind out a v unlikely 2 2 draw, as the Bolton away wins at OT when lightening struck twice. I may be unusual, but not certain that a love of football can't transcend all leagues.
Thanks for reading...the point of me doing this is twofold. As the cliche says "Dont criticise a man till you have walked a mile in his shoes" (cos then when you do, you are a mile away. And you have his shoes!) And second, football is a wonderful, amazing, frustrating game, can send you to the heights of delight and plunge you to the depths of despair...but...just supposing Bolton don't stay up, financially I am sure it will make a difference, emotionally, it makes no difference whatever league football is played in IMHO. I supported Bolton from the age of 4, and that includes some of the darkest horrible times in the 70s, and yes, it is unconditional, it has to be. Not uncritical, just constant.