Diary of a Sky Sports Soccer Saturday Reporter

As I prepared to cover Rochdale United’s FA Cup first round away tie for Sky Sports, it dawned on me the extent to the decline of their opponents Bradford City.

I remember the day David Wetherall headed in the winning goal against Liverpool on the last day of the season to maintain their top flight status for another year. That was May 2000, now is November 2011 and Bradford are 21st in the League… not the Premier League, but the bottom division of the Football League!

Just 45 minutes into the tie with Rochdale, I began to understand why Bradford were flirting with relegation into the non-league ranks as they produced one of the most abject performances I’d ever seen.

Fortunately Rochdale were no better, so it was scoreless at the break. But it was very sad to watch. Please be clear, I have no major feelings for Bradford City, apart from the fact they once held my PB of eight for the amount of stewards I needed to ask to find out where to collect my press pass (Coventry have since smashed the record with 13!).

But their plummet through the divisions and similar stories from Charlton, Luton and Swindon should be a warning to the fans of clubs like Fulham, Wigan and Wolves that top flight football isn’t guaranteed all the time. Credit to Bradford though, they got better after the interval and progressed through to the next round (with Charlton, Luton and Swindon!) thanks to a superb late goal from Nahki Wells. And, as I left the ground, I overheard two young Bradford fans talking with so much enthusiastic optimism about their team.

It was lovely to hear but also understandable since their expectations are so much lower, simply because they weren’t even born when Wetherall scored all those years ago.