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My trip to Carlisle on Saturday was a real eye opener. Nothing to do with seeing us toss away a three goal lead, but for the journey itself. I’d made a last minute decision to go and didn’t fancy driving up there myself so I grabbed the last seat on the coach from the Junction Inn.

Sitting at the back of the coach I was surrounded by seventeen and eighteen year olds and I found it fascinating. I guess I don’t tend to mix too much with that age group but listening to them gave me a whole new perspective on modern day football. Ignoring the fact that I only understood half of what they said (I know now that everything is sick), I was genuinely surprised with their take on things.

I’ve contemplated in the past about the fact that there is a generation of Latics fans growing up who have no memory of the ‘glory years’ but I’d not really thought of quite what that meant. If you consider that most kids probably start going to football when they are about ten years old, that means that very few under the age of 27 will have any memory of us playing in the Premier League. Even worse, those under the age of 24 will be able to remember us playing in any division other than League One. That’s scary. We’re not just talking about kids here.

The lads on the back of the coach will probably have seen the last seven or eight seasons. In that time, we’ve finished sixth on one occasion (2006/7) and in 2004/5 we just avoided the drop finishing 19^th. Other than that and a cup win at Goodison, pretty much nothing has happened. Many of our older fans spend a lot of time complaining that we are not attracting enough young fans. Perhaps we should be marvelling at the fact that we are attracting as many as we are.

The attitude of the lads to other clubs also came as a bit of a surprise. I’m quite open about the fact that I have a dislike for a number of clubs but my real hatred is split between the reds down the road and W*nky Wanderers ( and not 50/50). The journey up to Cumbria coincided with United playing Everton. I automatically assumed that pretty much everyone on the bus would want an Everton win. To my surprise, there was great excitement behind me when Hernandez scored what turned out to be the winner. Again this was a sign of the changing face of football. It wasn’t that they wanted an away win. They’d got Hernandez in their fantasy team and some of them had got a United win in their accumulator. It’s a strange concept to me but perhaps it makes sense. Why would they have any strong feelings towards a team that they have never seen us play?

It should be stressed that these are not random lads I’m talking about, these are kids who are spending a large proportion of their disposable income following OAFC. In short they are the future of the club. Perhaps these are the people the club should be talking to about how to increase our fanbase and perhaps those of us old enough to remember Roger Palmer/Rodger Wilde/George Hardwick (delete as appropriate) should remember how lucky we are and show them a little more respect.