The Salop Diaries

We live in the age of the extreme. The political sphere is split between left and right, and the poisonous rhetoric from both sides spills over into every facet of life – even the world of sport, as the recent World Cup bore testimony. Little old Shrewsbury Town is not exempt from this trend. Complain about the club’s malaise of recent years and you are labelled a “doom monger”. Dare to express any kind of positivity and there are plenty ready to point and call you a “happy clapper”. Yet, as we prepare to enter the 2026/27 campaign, I find myself reflecting on a phrase oft repeated by one of my Salopcast co-hosts, Ollie Warner, who likes to say that two things can be true at the same time. It is true, certainly, that Shrewsbury Town is a football club that has been on a downward trajectory over the past five years or so. I share the frustration of every supporter who wants to see new investment and new ideas come into the club and give us a fighting chance of competing in an age when m...

On 29 April 2003, Shrewsbury Town lost 3-2 at home to Carlisle United. It was the result that confirmed, beyond mathematical doubt, our relegation from the Football League. As I walked from the Riverside onto the Wakeman End to make my way out of the ground, I’m not ashamed to say I shed a few tears. I’m not an emotive man. I wish I was, but I tend to keep my feelings bottled up. My wife will tell you there weren’t even tears of joy on our wedding day. It’s just not my way. But, under the Gay Meadow lights that night, I welled up and tasted the salty tears that rolled slowly down my cheeks into my mouth. Football does this to us. Shrewsbury Town does this to us. It shouldn’t matter so much, but it does. As this agonising, wretched season goes on, as we stumble from one gut-wrenching low to the next, I find myself thinking about that night more and more. The future isn’t written yet, of course, but we can all see that abyss opening up before us, and it leaves me feeling anxious. Helples...