I Want to Fall in Love with Bolton Wanderers Again

As we are now on the eve of the new season, football fans starved for the past 3 months are greedily hovering up every single article - all of them previewing the new season and talking about expectations.

What would be considered "a success" for our club is the main topic. Yet another bleak article boo-hooing about our perilous financial woes is of no interest to me, so in line with our all newly lowered expectations I am going to talk about my hopes for 2015/16.

I want to fall in love with Bolton Wanderers again a little bit more.

Cast your mind back to September last year, Dougie Freedman was still in charge and we had made a diabolical start to the season. The atmosphere was pretty poisonous at the Macron.

Going to the match was hard work. We played Sheffield Wednesday in a shocker of a 0-0, I forgot every single thing about the game the second the ref brought the tedium to a close.

Walking away from the ground I felt a mixture of immediate amnesia and antipathy. What is the point? Unfortunately this was not a unique experience - and certainly not unique to Bolton Wanderers - the truth is all football supporters feel like this at some point.

But then on the Tuesday we played Rotherham United under the floodlights thanks to a hat trick from Joe Mason.

The truth is we are only beat them because we were slightly less shit than them (a team who only survived relegation by 1 spot). But it was the nature of the game that made people leaving happy.

It was a mad, ferocious, ragged, chaotic 2nd half. A hat trick for one of ours, 2 disallowed goals for them, the ludicrously fat pantomime villain Steve Evans lumbering up and down the touchline, goalies going up for corners.

Lovely stuff. What more could you want? Let's face it we are not a good team, haven't been for years but this was brilliant.

My expectations are not artificially unrealistic. I would absolutely love top 6 finish, a good cup run or even a couple of big name scalps, but as is often the case of a football romantic, it is always the hope that kills you in the end.

In truth all I really want is something to get excited about once in a while.

Rotherham to be fair wasn't the only one all season but it was incidents rather than games that stood out: (Emile Heskey's goal v Blackburn Rovers; Zach Clough v Wigan Athletic; Darren Pratley's Scorpion kick), but it is these bits that remind you what it is to be a football fan, and why you need to be at game just in case "Maybe this week /month/ season" it will be our time.

It usually isn't. But sometimes it is - and however fleetingly we must embrace these moments and enjoy them for what they are - a moment of euphoria which balances out everything else.

Roll on the footie.