To renew, or not to renew? (that is the question)

There seem to be quite a few contributory factors which have led to this rather sorry state of affairs and relegation is only one of them.

Across much of the Premier League (and indeed much of the Championship), gates have been falling slowly but steadily over the past few seasons, with only the Big Four and those lucky few enjoying resurgence who have escaped from the general drift.

Part of this exodus is surely down to the amount of football shown live on TV, or available streamed on the internet (often, admittedly, in rather poor quality). During the season, Sky and Setanta between them show two or three top flight games every weekend, giving football fans plenty of opportunity to watch the big names on a regular basis.

Aggressive marketing of Man Utd, Chelsea, Liverpool and Arsenal means that their have supporters worldwide, often at the expense of local teams. The jokes about Man Utd supporters having cockney accents are legend, so I won't bother going into them here. Through satellite TV, it is easy to watch these teams without leaving the comfort of your own living room, surely a tempting prospect on a freezing February night.

Another side-effect of the amount of football on TV is the many changes in kickoff times; football used to be 3.00 p.m. on a Saturday and now it seems to be anything but that. At least for us, that will be one of the advantages of being in the Championship next season.

It's easy to watch football on TV, easy to get out of the routine of Saturday afternoons being football and also easy to find other things to spend hard-earned money on.

It's an expensive game to watch week-in, week-out and although following Blues is by no means the most expensive team in the country, it is not the cheapest either and some season tickets at Villa Park cost significantly less than at St Andrew's, despite the reductions that have just been announced.

Paying more for the Championship football than some fans pay to see the Premier League is a very bitter pill to swallow and a major turn-off for quite a few of the fans I talk to regularly. This, added to the awful disappointment of being one point short of survival has been enough for some.

There have also been occasions over the last few years when our fans have been lambasted for not turning up to games; a rather spectacular shot in the foot from David Sullivan who, although perfectly entitled to his own opinion, maybe needs to find a better, more encouraging way of couching the words. We as fans want to feel that our support is appreciated rather than being shouted at for not providing it!

The general uncertainty at the club has also not helped. Things had not been right for a while; there was discontent following the last relegation and a lot of mutterings about how the team was performing latterly under Steve Bruce.

At least the Carson Yeung affair bought that to a head and I still maintain that we are very fortunate to have Alex McLeish, but it's easy to see that the club is still in a state of flux and I will be surprised if we do not have new owners by this time next year.

I'm sure that in a week or two another letter will find its way on to the doormat. I might have made my mind up by then, I might not. As I can't guarantee to get to every single home game next season, it might well be that I am better off buying tickets on the gate, particularly when the special offers start being issued.

As for a seat in the "singing section", maybe I'll deal with that another time....