A fan's-eye view from Turf Moor, with Stephen Cummings

IT WOULD be malicious to mock any football club on the brink of relegation.

It would be callous indeed to poke fun at the all-but-inevitable demise of an outfit which has had £100 million invested in it over the last four years.

And only the flintiest of hearts could revel in the personal hell that the fans of that club must be going through. Unless, of course, that club is Blackburn Rovers and you are a Burnley supporter.

Yes, Clarets fans, it looks as though there may be a God after all - although we'll have to wait until around 10pm on Wednesday evening for official confirmation.

For those who would seek to admonish me for my opinions and mutter a curt, "Tsk! Tsk!" of disapproval as I wave a huge Claret and Blue flag whilst dancing merrily on Rovers' Premiership grave, I ask this - "How do you expect me to react?"

Football is built on passionate parochialism and the fierce fanaticism which roars in its wake. Manchester United and Liverpool despise one another, ditto Wolves and West Brom, Torquay and Exeter, and of course Burnley and Blackburn. Everyone knows this enduring truth is central to football 'fandom'.

Well, almost everyone that is. It appears there are some people out there who remain blissfully unaware of the concept. And most of them were calling Radio Lancashire's football phone-in on Saturday evening. "I like all the Lancashire clubs to do well" is a frequently aired yet particularly feeble line. For my money, any caller espousing this view should be instantly cut off. Instead, they are allowed to drone on in an embarrassingly addled fashion about some inanity or other - usually for a good 15 minutes or so.

Last Saturday's show fell victim to particularly Draconian censorship. Host Gary Hickson (who, in all seriousness, appears to have adopted Alan Partridge as a role model), refused to talk to almost any Burnley fan who wished to have a good chuckle at Rovers' expense.

Yet what did he expect? Our most loathed rivals were on the verge of being given the bum's rush from football's Premier party. Of course we wanted to take the Micky. They would have done it to us, and quite rightly too.

I make no apologies for preferring my passion undiluted. We hate them. They hate us. And that's exactly how it should be.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.