CITY'S TRUE COLOURS

A few years ago I felt for Newcastle United supporters. Such great fans, such a nasty team. Bowyer, Woodgate, Bellamy, Dyer. The club seemed to be attracted to troublemakers. I was relieved that I supported a club like Manchester City. For all City's faults, this wouldn't happen to us.

City might have had endured a quarter-century-long silverware famine but at least we were popular. We played with humour and adventure, and there were likely to be goals. I was proud of the make-up of the team - Shaun Wright-Phillips played with a constant smile, Shaun Goater spent his time off the pitch rescuing children from poverty, and in midfield we solved the Middle East crisis with two great ball-players, the Algerian Muslim Ali Benarbia and Israeli Eyal Berkovic in perfect sync (albeit briefly). That team was City through and through.

How times change. Few City fans have recovered from Ben Thatcher's grotesque elbowing of Portsmouth's Pedro Mendes last week. Unfortunately the assault was all of a piece. His list of previous is as long as the offending arm: the elbowing of Sunderland's Nicky Summerbee playing for Wimbledon (this "challenge" was said to have cost him a call-up to the England squad and turned him towards Wales); the stamp on Poland's Kamil Kosowski while playing for Wales that resulted in another ban; the "tackle" in China during the close season that led to an opponent suffering a punctured lung.

The first time I saw him in City colours was at a friendly at Reading. My mate Bricey G thought I had flipped in that match, and perhaps he was right. I'd never badmouthed City players for the hell of it, but then again I'd never seen anybody like Thatcher. After one tackle left a Reading player lucky his leg was still in one piece, I started screaming abuse. "Get off the pitch, you are not a City player, you are scum." I lost it. Not only was he useless and called Thatcher, he was a reckless yob.

The worst thing about today's Manchester City is that Thatcher is not alone. Danny Mills has an appalling disciplinary record. Niggling Paul Dickov, whom City recently re-signed, is regularly cited in fan polls of the most hated footballers. As for Joey Barton, his charge sheet includes stubbing a cigar out in his team-mate Jamie Tandy's eye, beating up a 15-year-old Everton fan, biting the current captain Richard Dunne after he tried to break up a fight, and starting a 10-man-brawl after a wild tackle in another "friendly".

Somehow the naive Stuart "Psycho" Pearce thinks these are all players in his mould. They are not. Pearce was hard but fair. Last time Barton got in trouble, Pearce decided what he needed was another chance and therapy. Apparently he had low self-esteem. Barton returned to the team a few weeks later with a Messiah complex, demanding a transfer because none of his team-mates matched up to him. Now City insiders are suggesting Thatcher needs the same. Will he return to the team convinced he is Roberto Carlos and demand a transfer to Real Madrid? We can but hope.

What happens when you despise the individuals who make up your team? I'm beginning to find out, and it's not pleasant. It's unsustainable and leads to a form of psychosis. "Good ball, Barton, you bastard!" "Well in, Thatcher, you cretin!" The relationship between fan and team is one of the most intimate in life. You give unquestioning love, you cheer for them, you defend their misdemeanours. And when they betray you, and when you disown them, there is nothing quite as painful.

There is a contradiction at the heart of City. This week the club said it wanted to be more inclusive and announced it had signed up to a scheme to help it attract more gay fans and staff. Which is great in principle, but what chance is there of it working when it continues to hire players who conform to the worst loutish, laddish stereotypes?

Four days post-Thatcher, we beat Arsenal 1-0. I had been waiting 15 years for this result, but I felt nothing. In the end, supporting a football team is an act of faith. We forgive them their failings, so long as they are true to us. But when our heroes reveal themselves to be cheats, thugs and scumsters, what are we left to believe in?