Season 2006-7 - Have you enjoyed it?

[YF Dan]

I've actually enjoyed this season more than most thinking about it. The football hasn't been too bad....I reckon you could easily swap the top 12 teams in the Conference for the bottom 12 teams in Div 4 without any change in quality to either division.

Southport was my favourite away trip for ages: getting drunk in Liverpool among Barcelona fans and &quotscouse&quot daytrippers, getting more drunk in Southport, winning, excellent chips, further drinks in some truly ridiculous Southport nightspots, waking up feeling like death.

The grounds have been a mixture of good, bad and hilarious, much like Div 4. Only Tamworth, Gravesend and St Albans have been truly awful, but then so is gay Meadow, Moss Rose and Boston's ground (whose name temporarily escapes me).

BBC Oxford, Sky and Yellow monster have luckily covered the lack of media coverage issue between them.

It's been cheaper to get in everywhere, there are fewer idiots and a higher percentage of &quotgenuine&quot fans.

Nope, Ive quite enjoyed this Conference lark. I desperately want it to end in glory on May 20th obviously, but I'll tell the tale in years to come with fondness.

Hopefully.

[neilw]

I've loved it, cause I'm back in love with my football team

[Mark G]

I've enjoyed the season for the main part although some of the games have been dire (R&ampD at home or Woking away on their in-land Beach springs to mind).

Enjoyed Forest Green away in particular as it was a friendly atmosphere with a good score and those that tried to spoil it, we got to laugh at (Slumdon muppets in the home terrace) as they were kept back ( '5-1 and you can't go home' .

Don't want to do it again though. Please win the play-offs, Oxford!

[GodalmingYellow]

I've voted no, mainly because no intermediate option was provided in the question and the loss of standard and league status far outweighs the benefits for me.

There have been good and bad times of course. Its been really good to go to grounds where opposition fans genuinely want to interact. ITs been really nice to watch in a relaxed sense, being able to turn up later, parking easier, new places to visit, and for the most part, Oxford being a strong side for the division.

But I can't get over the loss of league status, the loss playing in the league cup which we won in the not so distant memory, loss of little things like match and results coverage in the press and on TV, perhaps to a small extent the loss of glamour that league football brings.

This negative side is of course founded upon years of poor football and being in a position below what I would regard as the Oxford norm. I so want us to get back to Championship level football, and we simply can't do that as a non-league outift.

[Resurrection Ox]

I've enjoyed it. Absolutely. Whatever happens in the next couple of weeks. So what if we lost league status Terry? That was then. Don't let the events of May 6 2006 spoil the here and now. We've had a go and the support has generally been tremendous.

Been to more away games then many a previous season. Good laugh at Forest Green , Kiddie, Dagenham (both times). Plus the 'massive' terrace at Grays.

Worst games . Don't mention Rushden. Both times. Plus the game on Woking beach. Freezing.

I have not enjoyed the performances of Mr R Brevett either. A dirty old so and so who cons his way through matches..

[Snake]

I enjoyed the first 20 games enormously (yes, even the Wycombe game) and in particular I liked going to the unfamiliar away grounds in a perverse kind of way.

In football terms I think that's parlance for &quotsing when you're winning&quot.

No vote from me yet on the season as a whole - and it still scares me that we will be trying to secure an historic place at Wembley on a Tuesday night when we’ve only won twice on that night in the last 8 years (and one of those nights was that awful Lewes replay game that extended our season so unnecessarily).

[A-Ro]

I'm in agreement with Terry for the most part. I hate where we are, I hate the terrifying thought that we might still be here next season and I've hated most of the grounds that I've been to this season.

Some positives are

Winning more games than losing

Having more fans than the home fans

Better support in general

Better media coverage - The Non League Paper and appearing live on telly more times this season than in the last ten.

And Confguide - top web site - the league could learn something.

[Matt D]

i can only answer this question after our play-off games have been decided.

there have been some great days, football, and i completely agree that the opposition supporters have been far less objectionable than many you find in the football league, some even verging on the pleasant.

i've enjoyed the fact that the stagnation around the club seems to have come to an end. i've enjoyed the sense of 'purgatory' this season, an examination of the club and what it wants to be.

but if it turns out to be damnation rather than purgatory, if this turns out to be a lost opportunity, then i can't help but feel in future years that that feeling will outweigh all the good things.

[SteMerritt]

Have answered 'No', but would probably have taken a middle option should there have been one.

It hasn't been as bad as I expected it to be, but the thought of another season down here is not a good one. Please get us back up. I still haven't been able to force myself to an away game - I don't want to watch my club play a league match at a St Albans ground where I watched us playing a low-key pre-season friendly a few years ago, or in grounds that Thame United have played games in recently (Weymouth for example)

But I must say there is a much better 'feel' to the club now, and the future is brighter than it was 18 months ago, even if we do have another year out of the football league.

[Pe├▒a Oxford United]

Hard to say at this distance.

For what it's worth, I don't feel homesick when following games on the internet, which I occasionally do where cricket is concerned.

[Myles Francis]

I'm a &quotYes&quot, on balance. As others have said, it's not been anywhere near as bad as feared and not being out of the top 2 all season would be seen as a resounding success were it not for the fact that only 1 club goes up automatically.

It's great to be playing in a league with a significant number of clubs in and around the south-east too, rather than the Northern-centric Division Four.

[recordmeister]

I have voted &quotyes&quot as this has been my first season (and poss only ever season) where, come 3pm on sat, I will have been to every single league away game. Every bloody ground in the division. And it has been wonderful. And cheap! The only time I have ever paid over £13 is when I had to sit with me old man on a couple of games, and up it to £15! Never again will a season be so cheap and so full of thrills.

Woo! Roll on the play-offs!

[boris]

Never again will a season be so cheap and so full of thrills.

Except, possibly, next season...

[Pe├▒a Oxford United]

I have voted &quotyes&quot as this has been my first season (and poss only ever season) where, come 3pm on sat, I will have been to every single league away game.

The closest I came was the season where we had to play at Boothferry Park on Boxing Day. I went to all the others, but not that one. I could have gone all right, but I just thought it wes a bad joke and didn't go on principle.

[Isaac]

I've throughly enjoyed it - I've been to more away games than home games though and I've generally seen us win which makes a big difference. A lot of the away games feel like FA Cup 1st round matches, especially as we are the biggest side in the division and the danger is if we stay down next season the novelty would have well and truly worn off. I think if we get promoted at Wembley most fans will see this as one of the best seasons for many, many years, if we don't get promoted next season will be grim.