What does our football club's history really mean?

One or two people have asked me why I keep banging on about the history of our football club. This is a strange thing to ask, of course, because how do they know that I keep 'banging on' about it if they haven't already taken time out to read what I write? It is a paradox brought about by them criticising what I am 'banging on' about by reading what I write in order to form that judgment. And, in my view, if they read what I write then they must be interested in my content in the first place, otherwise why do they read it?

Said another way, how do they know that I am constantly writing about the history of Cray Wanderers if they don't keep taking the time to read what I have written? If that is the case then are they hypocrites? Maybe, maybe not. What do they not approve of about the club's history or it being written about? Only they know. And, if they follow the club themselves, don't they realise that they are making history and also observing it around them too? Hmmm.

Is this a Catch-22 situation? Not really, but there is an irony about it. Somebody criticising what I write but is nevertheless interested in what I write before complaining about it themselves.

I realise that there is a growing reluctance among younger members and even newer supporters of the football club to recognise or even learn about our club's history. Unfortunately, that is a sign of the changing times, yet somewhere down the line they will experience an epiphany and a light will switch on where they will wish they had spent more time learning about the club's past. Not quite of burning bush proportions. But, the time will come, I can assure you.

How do I know? Because, like most Cray Wanderers supporters — and I dare say supporters of many other clubs — I was young once and, all I cared about was 'if we didn't win today, maybe we'll win next week'. I have been there, done that, I still have the moth-eaten old t-shirt and I have munched on the pie.

But, where does the bit come in about continuing to make history? Quite simple. Even since I stopped watching the team play in the early 1980s and started watching again in 2003 and up to the present time, Cray have created many youth teams, have won the Kent League title three times, have groundshared with what is now a Football League club, have reached a second FA Vase quarter-final, been promoted to the Isthmian League, beaten an up-and-coming football club called AFC Wimbledon 2-0 thus breaking their 78 league games unbeaten run, built their own stadium, now play at their own stadium, introduced ladies' and girls' teams — and have won (and lost) the Heritage Cup against our friends from Sheffield FC. And I bet there's obvious bits that I've accidentally missed out to boot! That's all club history.

Yes, all that is club history and, it will probably be documented in the next club book in fifty or a hundred years' time. And, believe me, if you can get your name into the contents or even on the front cover of such a publication, there is no greater club honour, even if you don't think about it at the moment — and I can speak very much from experience here.

A football club is nothing if it doesn't have its history. Even worse, if it has history and it is not documented, that's one helluva difficult job to salvage and bring to the fore later on down the line. The history of Cray Wanderers until now has mostly  been written about, making life easier for the next Jerry Dowlen or Pete Goringe to collate into a glossy new book, yet the club moves on and it makes history every week, month and season, just by being the oldest continually active football club in Greater London and the whole of the south of England. And that needs to be cherished. 

That's what our football club's history really means. I wonder who will step forward to do the job of continuing to document the Cray Wanderers story in years to come...?

Trevor Mulligan