(in a programme free era, is there room at the Bleacher Report for the above correspondent?)
For OCD-types and aspiring hoarders alike, dropping hard earned cash on a bunch of sickening propaganda barely readable press releases with a glossy cover is part and parcel of the English football experience. However, citing a recent West Ham match in Palermo that occurred without an official programme being produced, The Ball Is Round considers whether the whole exercise is worth it.
I still tend to buy a programme when I go to visit a new club. Take Wealdstone for instance. I have nothing against them “ it just happened to be one of the last programmes I bought when they played a pre-season game in late July against Dagenham & Redbridge. The club produced a 32 page programme covering their pre-season games against Dagenham and Watford later in the week for £2.
Value for money? Well not really. Take away 4 pages of adverts, 2 pages dedicated to the team line ups, 2 pages taken up by forthcoming season fixtures and you have 24 pages of content. Plenty there for everyone wouldn™t you say? Well, 9 1/2 pages were taken up to a review of the visitors Dagenham & Redbidge yet there wasn™t a single page devoted to Watford. The rest was a mix of photos and articles that had also appeared on their website. So what value did any fans get out of the programme? 9 1/2 pages for the away team? When there was more Dagenham players than fans at the game? Wealdstone fans surely don™t want to have such detail about a team they will more than likely never see play again.