Just after the 2009 season, several fans of Chattanooga FC got together and decided that their club needed an online forum where fans of the team could share their interest in the local NPSL club and the world game in general. The unofficial team blog called the Chattahooligan was the result. Since the authors all post under the pseudonym “John Q. Chattanooga”, I was obliged to conduct an email interview, and John Q. graciously responded. Below is that brief transcript.
NPSL Insider: How did the Chattahooligan come about?
John Q. Chattanooga: The Chattahooligan.com is the brainchild of several avid Chattanooga FC fans. In fact, we are all just plain old soccer fans, and we all are well acquainted with the soccer culture of many more established clubs and the many fan sites that they boast. We thought it would be great to create forum for soccer fans in Chattanooga just like those fans of other clubs have… So we took the moniker of the Chattanooga FC faithful – ‘The Chattahooligans’ – and started a blog.
It’s new to all of us doing the writing though, so there has been a bit of a learning curve. Apologies if we aren’t quite so interesting and dynamic as fan sites for Barcelona, or Arsenal or AC Milan… we’ll get there. Especially once the season starts.
Who is John Q Chattanooga/why the alias?
John Q. Chattanooga was already an alias for a Chattanooga soccer crazy who did his part to keep our collective football enthusiasm high – especially for the US Men’s National Team. For many reasons he wished to remain anonymous (and still does). We use the alias to represent a unified front for several different people doing our blogging and scouting.
We feel that anonymity will allow us to keep our inside sources secret – as well as to allow us to be critical of referees, players, coaches and even the Chattanooga FC board if need be. It helps to ensure freedom of speech that can be a voice of dissent from the CFC ‘party line’ if ever the need should arise.
And it will also allow us to ‘pass the baton’ to new, fresh Chattahooligan voices one day while maintaining a consistent identity and audience.
Do you guys have anything special planned for the 2010 season?
We do: in particular, we are trying to galvanize a strong core group of Chattahooligans to develop some elaborate and entertaining cheers – better than the fans heard last season.
We hope to produce some nice looking game banners, flags and wearables for our faithful… to create an overall enthusiastic presence at games.
We will no doubt have some nice little parties for the Champions League and, of course, the World Cup!
We also hope to galvanize a nucleus of dedicated fans to make the trip to away games (and to charter a bus!). Let us know if you’re into that.
Why do you think Chattanooga FC has been so successful getting fans in the seats?
That’s a great question, and its one that is hard to answer. We believe it is not one thing, but a combination of all these little things:
1. Chattanoogans a
re very proud of our city, and we want the world to know it. But we don’t have many sports teams, so we don’t have many opportunities to express our collective spirit in the way that sporting events allow for… Our college teams (UTC) and our minor baseball team have been it up until now. We feel that Chattanooga FC is able to add opportunities to cheer for something distinctly Chattanoogan.
2. Our stadium is very nice, but it is hardly used at all over the course of the year. We think people are glad to have another reason to come to a great venue.
3. This might be a misinterpretation on our part, but to us it seems that in Chattanooga, soccer appears to be interesting to many people who wouldn’t normally be inclined to go to sporting events. It’s odd, but it’s like soccer is a “cool” sport and therefore acceptable for those who never were really that interested in cheering for a team.
4. The environment is fun and easygoing. You can bring your family. You can have a conversation. You can cheer. You can get some great food from local vendors (vs generic stadium food).
5. Beer. We serve it, and it’s cheap, too.
6. It feels like this is just the beginning of something great:
We have MANY international companies opening branches/factories here in Chattanooga. French, Belgian, Brazilian, Spanish and several German (not the least of which is VW!) companies are coming here. While alot of hires will be local, there will no doubt be internationals too – and we expect them to be really happy to see that we have a soccer team.
And, with the current craziness in the world of professional soccer – the USL breakup, the formation of the NASL, some MLS clubs having NPSL development teams – it feels like there might be great opportunities for our team to grow into a really competitive (and perhaps even pro) club.
We think the fans sense all of this, it’s a good vibe and they want to be part of it.
Anything else you’d like to add?
We’re glad that you at the NPSL have noticed our humble little blog, but we don’t seem to have a very large following yet. We’d like every Chattanooga FC fan to be regular visitors – and even contributors – to our site. And we’d love to have folks from all around the country (and the world) join in too.
Thank for this pseudo-interview.
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